NEIGHBORS 


•The 


THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

NEW  YORK   •    BOSTON   •    CHICAGO  •    DALLAS 
ATLANTA   •    SAN   FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN  &  CO.,  Limited 

LONDON   •    BOMBAY  •   CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE  MACMILLAN  CO.  OF  CANADA,  Ltd. 

TORONTO 


IJTTI.r,  LonSA  S  KIXCKRS  WKIJK  \IMHl>i:i!  THAN'  HKI!  MOTIIEK  S. 
SHK  WAS  OXLY  EIGHT,  HIT  SIIF.  SOON'  LEARNED  I'O  TIE  A 
PUME." 


NEIGHBORS 


LIFE   STORIES   OF  THE  OTHER   HALF 


BY 


JACOB  A.  RIIS 

AUTHOR  OP 
"  HOW  THE  OTHER  HALF  LIVES,"  "  THE  MAKING  OF 
AN  AMERICAN,"  "CHILDREN  OF  THE  TENE- 
MENTS," "  HERO  TALES  OF  THE 
FAR  NORTH,"  ETC. 


THE   MACMILLAN  COMPANY 
1914 

All  rights  reserved 


COPTEIGHT,  1914, 

By  the  MACMILLAN  COMPANY. 

Set  up  and  electrotyped.    Published  October,  1914.    Reprinted 
December,  1914. 


Norfaaoolj  JPress 

J.  8.  CuBhing  Co.  —  Berwick  &  Smith  Co. 

Norwood,  Mass.,  U.S.A. 


SRLF 
YRL 


PREFACE 

These  stories  have  come  to  me  from 
many  sources  —  some  from  my  own  expe- 
rience, others  from  settlement  workers, 
still  others  from  the  records  of  organized 
charity,  that  are  never  dry,  as  some  think, 
but  alive  with  vital  human  interest  and 
with  the  faithful  striving  to  help  the 
brother  so  that  it  counts.  They  have 
this  in  common,  that  they  are  true.  For 
good  reasons,  names  and  places  are 
changed,  but  they  all  happened  as  told 
here.  I  could  not  have  invented  them 
had  I  tried;  I  should  not  have  tried  if  I 
could.     For  it  is  as  pictures  from  the  life 


vi  PREFACE 

in  which  they  and  we,  you  and  I,  are 
partners,  that  I  wish  them  to  make  their 
appeal  to  the  neighbor  who  Hves  but 
around  the  corner  and  does  not  know  it. 

JACOB  A.  RIIS. 


CONTENTS 


PAOK 


The  Answer  of  Ludlow  Street         .        .        1 

Kin 11 

The  Wars  of  the  Rileys    .        .        .        .16 

Life's  Best  Gift 31 

Driven  from  Home 42 

The  Problem  of  the  Widow  Salvini  .      48 

Peter 63 

Kate's  Choice 70 

The  Mother's  Heaven  ....  82 
Where  he  Found  his  Neighbor  .        .      86 

What  the  Snowflake  Told         .        .        .     101 

The  City's  Heart 108 

Chips  from  the  Maelstrom         .        .        .122 

Heartsease 139 

His  Christmas  Gift 147 

Our  Roof  Garden  among  the  Tenements  157 
The  Snow  Babies'  Christmas  .  .  .168 
As  Told  by  the  Rabbi  .        .        .        .198 

The  Strand  from  Above      ....    205 

vii 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

"  Little  Louisa's  fingers  were  nimbler  than  her 
mother's.  She  was  only  eight,  but  she 
soon  learned  to  tie  a  plume  "     .        Frontispiece 

FACING  PAGE 

"He  tied  his  feet  together  with  the  prayer 
shawl,  and  looked  once  upon  the  rising 
sun" 9 

"  There  he  stood,  indiflferent,  bored  if  anything, 

shiftless  " 64 

"  If  Kate  sees  it,  she  steals  up  behind  her,  and, 
putting  two  affectionate  arms  around  her 
neck,  whispers  in  her  ear,  '  I  love  oo. 
Grannie'" 80 

"  When  we  had  set  up  a  Christmas  tree  to- 
gether, to  the  wild  delight  of  the  children  "       95 

"  Please,  your  Honor,  let  this  man  go !    It  is 

Christmas" 153 


iz 


NEIGHBORS 

THE  ANSWER  OF  LUDLOW  STREET 

"You  get  the  money,  or  out  you  go  ! 
I  ain't  in  the  business  for  me  health,"  and 
the  bang  of  the  door  and  the  angry  clatter 
of  the  landlord's  boots  on  the  stairs,  as 
he  went  down,  bore  witness  that  he  meant 
what  he  said. 

Judah  Kapelowitz  and  his  wife  sat  and 
looked  silently  at  the  little  dark  room  when 
the  last  note  of  his  voice  had  died  away 
in  the  hall.  They  knew  it  well  enough  — 
it  was  their  last  day  of  grace.  They  were 
two  months  behind  with  the  rent,  and 
where  it  was  to  come  from  neither  of  them 
knew.     Six    years    of    struggling    in    the 


2  NEIGHBORS 

Promised  Land,  and  this  was  what  it 
had  brought  them. 

A  hungry  little  cry  roused  the  woman 
from  her  apathy.  She  went  over  and  took 
the  baby  and  put  it  mechanically  to  her 
poor  breast.  Holding  it  so,  she  sat  by  the 
window  and  looked  out  upon  the  gray 
November  day.  Her  husband  had  not 
stirred.  Each  avoided  the  question  in  the 
other's  eyes,  for  neither  had  an  answer. 

They  were  young  people  as  men  reckon 
age  in  happy  days,  Judah  scarce  past 
thirty;  but  it  is  not  always  the  years 
that  count  in  Ludlow  Street.  Behind 
that  and  the  tenement  stretched  the  end- 
less days  of  suffering  in  their  Galician 
home,  where  the  Jew  was  hated  and 
despised  as  the  one  thrifty  trader  of 
the   country,   tortured   alike    by    drunken 


THE  ANSWER  OF  LUDLOW  STREET  3 

peasant  and  cruel  noble  when  they  were 
not  plotting  murder  against  one  another. 
With  all  their  little  savings  they  had  paid 
Judah's  passage  to  the  land  where  men 
were  free  to  labor,  free  to  worship  as  their 
fathers  did  —  a  twice-blessed  country, 
surely  —  and  he  had  gone,  leaving  Sarah, 
his  wife,  and  their  child  to  wait  for  word 
that  Judah  was  rich  and  expected  them. 

The  wealth  he  found  in  Ludlow  Street 
was  all  piled  on  his  push-cart,  and  his  perse- 
cutors would  have  scorned  it.  A  handful 
of  carrots,  a  few  cabbages  and  beets,  is 
not  much  to  plan  transatlantic  voyages 
on;  but  what  with  Sarah's  eager  letters 
and  Judah's  starving  himself  daily  to  save 
every  penny,  he  managed  in  two  long 
years  to  scrape  together  the  money  for 
the    steamship    ticket    that    set    all    the 


4  NEIGHBORS 

tongues  wagging  in  his  home  village  when 
it  came :  Judah  Kapelowitz  had  made  his 
fortune  in  the  far  land,  it  was  plain  to  be 
seen.  Sarah  and  the  boy,  now  grown  big 
enough  to  speak  his  father's  name  with 
an  altogether  cunning  little  catch,  bade  a 
joyous  good-by  to  their  friends  and  set 
their  faces  hopefully  toward  the  West. 
Once  they  were  together,  all  their  troubles 
would  be  at  an  end. 

In  the  poor  tenement  the  peddler  lay 
awake  till  far  into  the  night,  hearkening 
to  the  noises  of  the  street.  He  had 
gone  hungry  to  bed,  and  he  was  too 
tired  to  sleep.  Over  and  over  he  counted 
the  many  miles  of  stormy  ocean  and  the 
days  to  their  coming,  Sarah  and  the  lit- 
tle Judah.  Once  they  were  together,  he 
would    work,     work,   work  —  and    should 


THE  ANSWER  OF  LUDLOW  STREET  5 

they  not  make  a  living  in  the  great, 
wealthy  city  ? 

With  the  dawn  lighting  up  the  eastern 
sky  he  slept  the  sleep  of  exhaustion,  his 
question  unanswered. 

That  was  six  years  ago  —  six  hard,  weary 
years.  They  had  worked  together,  he  at 
his  push-cart,  Sarah  for  the  sweater,  earn- 
ing a  few  cents  finishing  *' pants"  when  she 
could.  Little  Judah  did  his  share,  pulling 
thread,  until  his  sister  came  and  he  had  to 
mind  her.  Together  they  had  kept  a  roof 
overhead,  and  less  and  less  to  eat,  till  Judah 
had  to  give  up  his  cart.  Between  the 
fierce  competition  and  the  police  black- 
mail it  would  no  longer  keep  body  and 
soul  together  for  its  owner.  A  painter 
in  the  next  house  was  in  need  of  a 
hand,   and  Judah  apprenticed   himself  to 


6  NEIGHBORS 

him  for  a  dollar  a  day.  If  he  could  hold 
out  a  year  or  two,  he  might  earn  journey- 
man's wages  and  have  steady  work.  The 
boss  saw  that  he  had  an  eye  for  the  busi- 
ness. But,  though  Judah's  eye  was  good, 
he  lacked  the  "strong  stomach"  which  is 
even  more  important  to  a  painter.  He 
had  starved  so  long  that  the  smell  of  the 
paint  made  him  sick  and  he  could  not  work 
fast  enough.  So  the  boss  discharged  him. 
"The  sheeny  was  no  good,"  was  all  the 
character  he  gave  him. 

It  was  then  the  twins  came.  There 
was  not  a  penny  in  the  house,  and  the  rent 
money  was  long  in  arrears.  Judah  went 
out  and  asked  for  work.  He  sought  no 
alms;  he  begged  merely  for  a  chance  to 
earn  a  living  at  any  price,  any  wages. 
Nobody   wanted    him,    as   was    right   and 


THE  ANSWER  OF  LUDLOW  STREET  7 

proper,  no  doubt.  To  underbid  the  living 
wage  is  even  a  worse  sin  against  society 
than  to  *' debase  its  standard  of  living,"  we 
are  told  by  those  who  should  know.  Judah 
Kapelowitz  was  only  an  ignorant  Jew,  plead- 
ing for  work  that  he  might  earn  bread  for 
his  starving  babies.  He  knew  nothing  of 
standards,  but  he  would  have  sold  his  soul 
for  a  loaf  of  bread  that  day.  He  found 
no  one  to  pay  the  price,  and  he  came  home 
hungry  as  he  had  gone  out.  In  the  after- 
noon the  landlord  called  for  the  rent. 

Another  tiny  wail  came  from  the  old 
baby  carriage  in  which  the  twins  slept, 
and  the  mother  turned  her  head  from  the 
twilight  street  where  the  lights  were  begin- 
ning to  come  out.  Judah  rose  heavily 
from  his  seat. 

'*I    go    get    money,"    he    said,    slowly. 


8  NEIGHBORS 

"I  work  for  Mr.  Springer  two  days.  He 
will  give  me  money."    And  he  went  out. 

Mr.  Springer  was  the  boss  painter.  He 
did  not  give  Judah  his  wages.  He  had  not 
earned  them,  he  said,  and  showed  him  the 
door.  The  man  pleaded  hotly,  despair- 
ingly. They  were  hungry,  the  little  kids 
and  his  wife.  Only  fifty  cents  of  the  two 
dollars  —  fifty  cents  !  The  painter  put  him 
out,  and  when  he  would  not  go,  kicked  him. 

"Look  out  for  that  Jew,  John,"  he  said, 
putting  up  the  shutters.  "We  shall  have 
him  setting  off  a  bomb  on  us  next.  They 
turn  Anarchist  when  they  get  desperate." 

Mr.  Springer  was,  it  will  be  perceived,  a 
man  of  discernment. 

Judah  Kapelowitz  lay  down  beside  his 
wife  at  night  without  a  word  of  complaint. 
"To-morrow,"  he  said,  "I  do  it." 


^I-  ^o:fl 


HE    TIED    HIS    FEET    TOGETHER    WITH    THE    PRAYER    SHAWL,    AND 
LOOKED    ONCE    UPON    THE    RISING    SUN," 


THE  ANSWER  OF  LUDLOW  STREET  9 

He  arose  early  and  washed  himself  with 
care.  He  bound  the  praying-band  upon 
his  forehead,  and  upon  his  wrist  the  tefillin 
with  the  Holy  Name;  then  he  covered  his 
head  with  the  tallith  and  prayed  to  the 
God  of  his  fathers  who  brought  them  out 
of  bondage,  and  blessed  his  house  and  his 
children,  little  Judah  and  Miriam  his  sister, 
and  the  twins  in  the  cradle.  As  he  kissed 
his  wife  good-by,  he  said  that  he  had  found 
work  and  wages,  and  would  bring  back 
money.  She  saw  him  go  down  in  his  work- 
ing clothes ;  she  did  not  know  that  he  had 
hidden  the  tallith  under  his  apron. 

He  did  not  leave  the  house,  but,  when 
the  door  was  closed,  went  up  to  the  roof. 
Standing  upon  the  edge  of  it,  he  tied 
his  feet  together  with  the  prayer  shawl, 
looked    once    upon    the    rising    sun,    and 


10  NEIGHBORS 

threw  himself  into  the  street,  seventy  feet 
below. 

"It  is  Judah  Kapelowitz,  the  painter," 
said  the  awed  neighbors,  who  ran  up  and 
looked  in  his  dead  face.  The  police  came 
and  took  him  to  the  station-house,  for 
Judah,  who  living  had  kept  the  law  of 
God  and  man,  had  broken  both  in  his  dying. 
They  laid  the  body  on  the  floor  in  front  of 
the  prison  cells  and  covered  it  with  the 
tallith  as  with  a  shroud.  Sarah,  his  wife, 
sat  by,  white  and  tearless,  with  the  twins 
at  her  breast.  Little  Miriam  hid  her 
head  in  her  lap,  frightened  at  the  silence 
about  them.  At  the  tenement  around  the 
corner  men  were  carrying  her  poor  belong- 
ings out  and  stacking  them  in  the  street. 
They  were  homeless  and  fatherless. 

Ludlow  Street  had  given  its  answer. 


KIN 

Early  twilight  was  setting  in  on  the 
Holy  Eve.  In  the  streets  of  the  city 
stirred  the  bustling  preparation  for  the 
holiday.  The  great  stores  were  lighting 
up,  and  crowds  of  shoppers  thronged  the 
sidewalks  and  stood  stamping  their  feet  in 
the  snow  at  the  crossings  where  endless 
streams  of  carriages  passed.  At  a  corner 
where  two  such  currents  met  sat  an  old 
man,  propped  against  a  pillar  of  the  ele- 
vated road,  and  played  on  a  squeaky  fiddle. 
His  thin  hair  was  white  as  the  snow  that 
fell  in  great  soft  flakes  on  his  worn  coat, 
buttoned   tight   to   keep   him   warm;    his 

face  was  pinched  by  want  and  his  back  was 

11 


12  NEIGHBORS 

bent.  The  tune  he  played  was  cracked 
and  old  like  himself,  and  it  stirred  no 
response  in  the  passing  crowd.  The  tin 
cup  in  his  lap  held  only  a  few  coppers. 

There  was  a  jam  of  vehicles  on  the  avenue 
and  the  crush  increased.  Among  the  new- 
comers was  a  tall  young  woman  in  a  fur 
coat,  who  stood  quietly  musing  while  she 
waited,  till  a  quavering  note  from  the  old 
man's  violin  found  its  way  into  her  reveries. 
She  turned  inquiringly  toward  him  and 
took  in  the  forlorn  figure,  the  empty  cup, 
and  the  indifferent  throng  with  a  glance. 
A  light  kindled  in  her  eyes  and  a  half- 
amused  smile  played  upon  her  lips ;  she 
stepped  close  to  the  fiddler,  touched  his 
shoulder  lightly,  and,  with  a  gesture  of 
gentle  assurance,  took  the  violin  from  his 
hands.     She  drew  the  bow  across  the  strings 


KIN  13 

once  or  twice,  tightened  them,  and  pon- 
dered a  moment. 

Presently  there  floated  out  upon  the 
evening  the  famihar  strains  of  "Old  Black 
Joe"  played  by  the  hand  of  a  master.  It 
rose  above  the  noise  of  the  street ;  through 
the  rattle  and  roar  of  a  train  passing  over- 
head, through  the  calls  of  cabmen  and 
hucksters,  it  made  its  way,  and  where  it 
went  a  silence  fell.  It  was  as  if  every  ear 
was  bent  to  listen.  The  crossing  was  clear, 
but  not  a  foot  stirred  at  the  sound  of  the 
policeman's  whistle.  As  the  last  strain  of 
the  tune  died  away,  and  was  succeeded  by 
the  appealing  notes  of  "'Way  Down  upon 
the  Suwanee  River,"  every  eye  was  turned 
upon  the  young  player.  She  stood  erect, 
with  heightened  color,  and  nodded  brightly 
toward  the  old  man.     Silver  coins  began  to 


14  NEIGHBORS 

drop  in  his  cup.  Twice  she  played  the  tune 
to  the  end.    At  the  repetition  of  the  refrain, 

•'  Oh,  darkies,  how  my  heart  grows  weary, 
Far  from  the  old  folks  at  home," 

a  man  in  a  wide-brimmed  hat  who  had  been 
listening  intently  emptied  his  pockets  into 
the  old  man's  lap  and  disappeared  in  the 
crowd. 

TraflSc  on  street  and  avenue  had  ceased ; 
not  a  wheel  turned.  From  street  cars  and 
cabs  heads  were  poked  to  find  out  the  cause 
of  the  strange  hold-up.  The  policeman 
stood  spellbound,  the  whistle  in  his  half- 
raised  hand.  In  the  hush  that  had  fallen 
upon  the  world  rose  clear  and  sweet  the 
hymn,  **It  came  upon  a  midnight  clear," 
and  here  and  there  hats  came  off  in  the 
crowd.     Once  more  the  young  woman  in- 


KIN  15 

clined  her  head  toward  the  old  fiddler, 
and  coins  and  banknotes  were  poured  into 
his  cup  and  into  his  lap  until  they  could 
hold  no  more.  Her  eyes  were  wet  with 
laughing  tears  as  she  saw  it.  When  she 
had  played  the  verse  out,  she  put  the  violin 
back  into  its  owner's  hands  and  with  a  low 
"Merry  Christmas,  friend  !"  was  gone. 

The  policeman  awoke  and  blew  his 
whistle  with  a  sudden  blast,  street  cars 
and  cabs  started  up,  business  resumed  its 
sway,  the  throng  passed  on,  leaving  the  old 
man  with  his  hoard  as  he  gazed  with  unbe- 
lieving eyes  upon  it.  The  world  moved 
once  more,  roused  from  its  brief  dream. 
But  the  dream  had  left  it  something  that 
was  wanting  before,  something  better  than 
the  old  man  had  found.  Its  heart  had 
been  touched. 


THE  WARS  OF  THE  RILEYS 

It  was  the  night  before  Washington's 
Birthday  that  Mr.  Riley  broke  loose. 
They  will  speak  of  it  long  in  the  Windy 
City  as  "the  night  of  the  big  storm,"  and 
with  good  right  —  it  was  "that  suddint 
and  fierce,"  just  like  Mr.  Riley  himself  in 
his  berserker  moods.  Mr.  Riley  was  one 
of  the  enlivening  problems  of  "the  Bureau" 
in  the  region  back  of  the  stock-yards  that 
kept  it  from  being  dulled  by  the  routine  of 
looking  after  the  poor.  He  was  more  :  he 
rose  to  the  dignity  of  a  "cause"  at  uncertain 
intervals  when  the  cost  of  living,  underpay 
and  overtime,  sickness  and  death,  over- 
population,   and    all    the    other   well-worn 

16 


THE  WARS  OF  THE  RILEYS  17 

props  of  poverty  retired  to  the  wings  and 
left  the  stage  to  Mr.  Riley  rampant,  suffi- 
cient for  the  time  and  as  informing  as  a 
whole  course  at  the  School  of  Philanthropy. 
In  between,  Mr.  Riley  was  a  capable  meat- 
cutter  earning  good  wages,  who  wouldn't 
have  done  a  neighbor  out  of  a  cent  that  was 
his  due,  a  robust  citizen  with  more  than  his 
share  of  good  looks,  a  devoted  husband 
and  a  doting  father,  inseparable  when  at 
home  from  little  Mike,  whose  baby  trick  of 
squaring  off  and  offering  to  "bust  his 
father's  face"  was  the  pride  of  the  block. 
"Win  yez  look  at  de  kid  .^  Ain't  he  a 
foine  one  ? "  shouted  Mr.  Riley,  with  peals 
of  laughter;  and  the  men  smoking  their 
pipes  at  the  fence  set  the  youngster  on  with 
admiring  taunts.  Mike  was  just  turned 
three.     His   great   stunt,   when   his  father 


18  NEIGHBORS 

was  not  at  hand,  was  to  fall  off  everything 
in  sight.  Daily  alarms  brought  from  the 
relief  party  of  hurrying  mothers  the  un- 
varying cry,  "Who's  got  hurted  ?  Is  it 
Mike?"  But  only  Mike's  feelings  were 
hurt.  Doleful  howls,  as  he  hove  in  sight, 
convoyed  and  comforted  by  Kate,  aged 
seven,  gave  abundant  proof  that  in  wind 
and  limb  he  was  all  that  could  be  desired. 
This  was  Mr.  Riley  in  his  hours  of  ease 
and  domesticity.  Mr.  Riley  rampant  was 
a  very  different  person.  His  arrival  was 
invariably  heralded  by  the  smashing  of  the 
top  of  the  kitchen  stove,  follo'wed  by  the 
summary  ejection  of  the  once  beloved 
family,  helter-skelter,  from  the  tenement. 
Three  times  the  Bureau  had  been  at  the 
expense  of  having  the  stove  top  mended  to 
keep  the  little  Rileys  from  starving  and 


THE  WARS  OF  THE  RILEYS  19 

freezing  at  once,  and  it  was  looking  forward 
with  concern  to  the  meat-cutter's  next 
encounter  with  his  grievance.  For  there 
was  a  psychological  reason  for  the  manner 
of  his  outbreaks.  The  Riley s  had  once 
had  a  boarder,  when  Kate  was  a  baby. 
He  happened  to  be  Mrs.  Riley's  brother, 
and  he  left,  presuming  on  the  kinship, 
without  paying  his  board.  As  long  as  the 
meat-cutter  was  sober  he  remembered  only 
the  pleasant  comradeship  with  his  brother- 
in-law,  and  extended  the  hospitality  of  a 
neighborly  fireside  to  his  wife's  relations. 
But  no  sooner  had  he  taken  a  drink  or  two 
than  the  old  grievance  loomed  large,  and 
grew,  as  he  went  on,  into  a  capital  injury,  to 
be  avenged  upon  all  and  everything  that  in 
any  way  recalled  the  monstrous  wrong  of  his 
life.     That  the  cooking-stove  should  come 


20  NEIGHBORS 

first  was  natural,  from  his  point  of  view. 
Upon  it  had  been  prepared  the  felonious 
meals,  by  it  he  had  smoked  the  pipe  of  peace 
with  the  false  friend.  The  crash  in  the 
kitchen  had  become  the  unvarying  signal 
for  the  hasty  exit  of  the  rest  of  the  family 
and  the  organizing  of  Kate  into  a  scouting 
party  to  keep  Mrs.  Riley  and  the  Bureau 
informed  about  the  progress  of  events  in  the 
house  where  the  meat-cutter  raged  alone. 

Mrs.  Riley  was  a  loyal,  if  not  always  a 
patient,  woman  —  who  can  blame  her  ?  — 
and  accepted  the  situation  as  part  of  the 
marital  compact,  clearly  comprehended, 
perhaps  foreshadowed,  in  her  vow  to  cling 
to  her  husband  "for  better  for  worse," 
and  therefore  not  to  be  questioned.  In 
times  of  peace  she  remembered  not  the 
days  of  storm   and   stress.     Once  indeed. 


THE  WARS  OF  THE  RILEYS  21 

when  her  best  gingham  had  been  sacrificed 
to  the  furies  of  war,  she  had  considered 
whether  the  indefinite  multipHcation  of 
the  tribe  of  Riley  were  in  the  long  run  desir- 
able, and  had  put  it  to  the  young  woman 
from  the  Bureau,  who  was  superintending 
the  repair  of  the  stove  top,  this  way :  "  I 
am  thinking,  Miss  Kane,  if  I  will  live 
with  Mr.  Riley  any  longer ;  would  you  ? " 
—  to  the  blushing  confusion  of  that  repre- 
sentative of  the  social  order.  However, 
that  crisis  passed.  Mr.  Riley  took  the 
pledge  for  the  fourth  or  fifth  time,  and  the 
next  day  appeared  at  the  oflBce,  volunteer- 
ing to  assign  himself  and  his  earnings  to 
the  Bureau  for  the  benefit  of  his  wife  and 
his  creditors,  reserving  only  enough  for 
luncheons  and  tobacco,  but  nothing  for 
drinks.     The  Bureau  took  an  hour  off  to 


22  NEIGHBORS 

recover  from  the  shock.  If  it  had  mis- 
givings, it  refused  to  listen  to  them.  The 
world  had  turned  a  corner  in  the  city  by 
the  lake  and  was  on  the  home-stretch  :  Mr. 
Riley  had  reformed. 

And,  in  truth,  so  it  seemed.  For  once  he 
was  as  good  as  his  word.  Christmas  passed, 
and  the  manifold  temptations  of  New  Year, 
with  Mike  and  his  father  still  chums.  Kate 
was  improving  the  chance  to  profit  by  the 
school-learning  so  fatally  interrupted  in 
other  days.  Seventeen  weeks  went  by  with 
Mr.  Riley's  wages  paid  in  at  the  Bureau 
every  Saturday ;  the  grocer  smiled  a  fat 
welcome  to  the  Riley  children,  the  clock 
man  and  the  spring  man  and  the  other 
installment  collectors  had  ceased  to  be 
importunate.  Mrs.  Riley  was  having  bliss- 
ful visions  of  a  new  spring  hat.     Life  back 


THE   WARS  OF  THE  RILEYS  23 

of  the  stock-yards  was  in  a  way  of  becom- 
ing ordinary  and  slow,  when  the  fatal 
twenty-second  of  February  hove  in  sight. 
The  night  before,  Mr.  Riley,  quitting 
work,  met  a  friend  at  the  gate,  who,  pity- 
ing his  penniless  state,  informed  him  that 
"there  was  the  price  of  a  drink  at  the  cor- 
ner" for  him,  meaning  at  Quinlan's  saloon. 
Now  this  was  prodding  the  meat-cutter  in 
a  tender  spot.  He  hated  waste  as  much  as 
his  employers,  who  proverbially  exploited 
all  of  the  pig  but  the  squeal.  He  didn't 
want  the  drink,  but  to  have  it  waiting 
there  with  no  one  to  come  for  it  was  wicked 
waste.  It  was  his  clear  duty  to  save  it, 
and  he  did.  Among  those  drinking  at  the 
bar  were  some  of  his  fellow- workmen,  who 
stood  treat.  That  called  for  a  return, 
and  Riley's  credit  was  good.     It  was  late 


24  NEIGHBORS 

before  the  party  broke  up ;  it  was  3  a.m. 
when  the  meat-cutter  burst  into  the  tene- 
ment, roaring  drunk,  clamoring  for  the 
lives  of  brothers-in-law  in  general  and  that 
of  his  own  in  particular,  and  smashed  the 
stove  lids  with  crash  after  crash  that  aroused 
the  slumbering  household  with  a  jerk. 

For  once  it  was  caught  napping.  The 
long  peace  had  bred  a  fatal  sense  of  security. 
Kate  was  off  scouting  duty  and  Mrs.  Riley 
had  her  hands  full  with  Pat,  Bridget,  and 
the  baby  all  having  measles  at  once  —  too 
full  to  take  warning  from  her  husband's 
suspicious  absence  at  bedtime.  Roused 
in  the  middle  of  the  night  to  the  defense  of 
her  brood,  she  fought  gallantly,  but  without 
hope.  The  battle  was  bloody  and  brief. 
Beaten  and  bruised,  she  gathered  up  her 
young  and  fled  into  the  blinding  storm  to 


THE  WARS  OF  THE  RILEYS  25 

the  house  of  a  pitying  neighbor,  who  took 
them  in,  measles  and  all,  to  snuggle  up  with 
his  own  while  he  mounted  guard  on  the 
doorstep  against  any  pursuing  enemy.  But 
the  meat-cutter  merely  slammed  the  door 
upon  his  evicted  family.  He  spent  the 
rest  of  the  night  smashing  the  reminders 
of  his  brother-in-law's  hated  kin.  Kate, 
reconnoitering  at  daybreak,  brought  back 
word  that  he  was  raging  around  the  house 
with  three  other  drunken  men.  The  open- 
ing of  the  Bureau  found  her  encamped  on 
the  doorstep  with  a  demand  that  help  come 
quickly  —  the  worst  had  happened.  "Has 
little  Mike  broken  his  neck  ? "  they  asked 
in  breathless  chorus.  "Worse  nor  that," 
she  panted;  "do  be  comin',  Miss  Kane  !" 
"Oh,  what  is  it  ?  Are  any  of  the  children 
dead.?" 


26  NEIGHBORS 

"Worse  nor  that;  Mr.  Riley  has  broke 
loose  !'*  Kate  always  spoke  of  her  father 
in  his  tantrums  as  Mister,  as  if  he  were  a 
doubtful  acquaintance.  Her  story  of  the 
night's  doings  was  so  lurid  that  the  in- 
timacy of  many  a  post-bellum  remorse  felt 
unequal  to  the  strain,  and  Miss  Kane  com- 
mandeered a  policeman  on  the  way  to  the 
house.  The  meat-cutter  received  her  with 
elaborate  inebriate  courtesy,  loftily  ignor- 
ing the  officer. 

"Who  is  he  ?"  he  asked,  aside. 

She  tried  evasion.  "A  friend  of  mine  I 
met."     She  was  sorry  immediately. 

"Is  he  that?  Then  he  is  no  friend  of 
mine.  Oh,  Miss  Kane,"  he  grieved,  "why 
did  you  go  for  to  get  him  ?  You  know  I'd 
have  protected  you  !"  This  with  an  indig- 
nant scowl  at  his  fellow-marauders,   who 


THE  WARS  OF  THE  RILEYS  27 

were  furtively  edging  toward  the  door. 
An  inquest  of  the  house  showed  the  devasta- 
tion of  war.  The  kitchen  was  a  wreck; 
the  bedroom  furniture  smashed ;  the  Morris 
chair  in  which  the  family  of  young  Rileys 
had  reveled  in  the  measles  lay  in  splinters. 
"It  was  so  hot  here  last  night,"  suggested 
the  meat-cutter,  gravely,  "it  must  have  fell 
to  pieces."  In  the  course  of  the  inspection 
Mrs.  Riley  appeared,  keeping  close  to  the 
policeman,  wrathful  and  fearful  at  once, 
with  a  wondrous  black  eye.  Her  husband 
regarded  it  with  expert  interest  and  ven- 
tured the  reflection  that  it  was  a  shame, 
and  she  the  fine-looking  woman  that  she 
was !  At  that  Mrs.  Riley  edged  away 
toward  her  husband  and  eyed  the  bluecoat 
with  hostile  looks. 

Between     crying    and     laughing,     "the 


28  NEIGHBORS 

Bureau  lady"  dismissed  the  policeman  and 
officiated  at  the  reunion  of  the  family  on 
condition  that  the  meat-cutter  appear  at 
the  office  and  get  the  dressing  down  which 
he  so  richly  deserved,  which  he  did.  But 
his  dignity  had  been  offended  by  the  brass 
buttons,  and  he  insisted  upon  its  being 
administered  by  one  of  his  own  sex. 

"I  like  her,"  he  explained,  indicating 
Miss  Kane  with  reproving  forefinger,  *'but 
she's  gone  back  on  me."  Another  grievance 
had  been  added  to  that  of  the  unpaid  board. 

The  peace  that  was  made  lasted  just  ten 
days,  when  Mr.  Riley  broke  loose  once 
more,  and  this  time  he  was  brought  into 
court.  The  whole  Bureau  went  along  to 
tell  the  story  of  the  compact  and  the  manner 
of  its  breaking.  Mr.  Riley  listened  atten- 
tively to  the  recital  of  the  black  record. 


THE  WARS  OF  THE  RILEYS  29 

"What  have  you  to  say  to  this  ?"  scowled 
the  Judge.     The  prisoner  nodded. 

"It  is  all  true  what  the  lady  says,  your 
Honor;  she  put  it  fair." 

"I  have  a  good  mind  to  send  you  to 
Bridewell  to  break  stone.'* 

"Don't  do  that,  Judge,  and  lose  me  job. 
I  want  to  be  wid  me  family."  Mrs.  Riley 
looked  imploringly  at  the  bench.  His 
Honor's  glance  took  in  her  face  with  the 
family  group. 

"Looks  like  it,"  he  mused;  but  in  the 
end  he  agreed  to  hand  him  over  to  the 
Bureau  for  one  more  trial,  first  administer- 
ing the  pledge  in  open  court.  Mr.  Riley 
took  the  oath  with  great  solemnity  and 
entire  good  faith,  kissed  the  Bible  with  a 
smack,  reached  up  a  large  red  fist  for  the 
Judge  to  shake,  and  the  clerk.     Then  he 


30  NEIGHBORS 

pledged  lasting  friendship  to  the  whole 
Bureau,  including  Miss  Kane,  whom  he 
generously  forgave  the  wrong  she  had  done 
him,  presented  little  Mike  to  the  Court  as 
"de  foinest  kid  in  de  ward,"  took  the 
gurgling  baby  from  Mrs.  Riley  and  gallantly 
gave  her  his  arm.  Leaning  fondly  upon 
it,  a  little  lame  and  sore  yet  from  the  fight 
and  with  one  eye  in  deep  mourning,  she 
turned  a  proudly  hopeful  look  upon  her 
husband,  like  a  rainbow  spanning  a  black 
departing  cloud.  And  thus,  with  fleet- 
footed  Kate  in  the  van  proclaiming  the 
peace,  and  three  prattling  children  clinging 
to  their  hands  and  clothes,  they  passed 
out  into  life  to  begin  it  anew.  And  bench 
and  Bureau,  with  sudden  emotion,  hope- 
lessly irrational  and  altogether  hopeful 
and  good,  cheered  them  on  their  way. 


LIFE'S  BEST  GIFT 

Margaret  Kelly  is  dead,  and  I  need 
not  scruple  to  call  her  by  her  own  name. 
For  it  is  certain  that  she  left  no  kin  to 
mourn  her.  She  did  all  the  mourning  her- 
self in  her  lifetime,  and  better  than  that 
when  there  was  need.  She  nursed  her 
impetuous  Irish  father  and  her  gentle 
English  mother  in  their  old  age  —  like  the 
loving  daughter  she  was  —  and,  last  of  all, 
her  only  sister.  When  she  had  laid  them 
away,  side  by  side,  she  turned  to  face  the 
world  alone,  undaunted,  with  all  the  fight- 
ing grit  of  her  people  from  both  sides  of  the 
Channel.  If  troubles  came  upon  her  for 
which  she  was  no  match,  it  can  be  truly 

31 


32  NEIGHBORS 

said  that  she  went  down  fighting.  And 
who  of  her  blood  would  ask  for  more  ? 

What  I  have  set  down  here  is  almost  as 
much  as  any  one  ever  heard  about  her 
people.  She  was  an  old  woman  when  she 
came  in  a  way  of  figuring  in  these  pages, 
and  all  that  lay  behind  her. 

Of  her  own  past  this  much  was  known : 
that  she  had  once  been  an  exceedingly 
prosperous  designer  of  dresses,  with  a 
brown-stone  house  on  Lexington  Avenue, 
and  some  of  the  city's  wealthiest  women 
for  her  customers.  Carriages  with  liveried 
footmen  were  not  rarely  seen  at  her  door, 
and  a  small  army  of  seamstresses  worked 
out  her  plans.  Her  sister  was  her  book- 
keeper and  the  business  head  of  the  house. 
Fair  as  it  seemed,  it  proved  a  house  of  cards, 
and  with  the  sister's  death  it  fell.     One  loss 


LIFE'S  BEST  GIFT  3S 

followed  another.  Margaret  Kelly  knew 
nothing  of  money  or  the  ways  of  business. 
She  lost  the  house,  and  with  it  her  fine 
clients.  For  a  while  she  made  her  stand  in 
a  flat  with  the  most  faithful  of  her  sewing- 
women  to  help  her.  But  that  also  had  to 
go  when  more  money  went  out  than  came 
in  and  nothing  was  left  for  the  landlord. 
Younger  rivals  crowded  her  out.  She  was 
stamped  "old-fashioned,"  and  that  was 
the  end  of  it.  Her  last  friend  left  her. 
Worry  and  perplexity  made  her  ill,  and 
while  she  was  helpless  in  Bellevue  Hospital, 
being  in  a  ward  with  no  "next  friend"  on 
the  books,  they  sent  her  over  to  the  Island 
with  the  paupers.  Against  this  indignity 
her  proud  spirit  arose  and  made  the  body 
forget  its  ills.  She  dragged  herself  down 
to  the  boat  that  took  her  back  to  the  city. 


34  NEIGHBORS 

only  to  find  that  her  last  few  belongings 
were  gone,  the  little  hall  room  she  had 
occupied  in  a  house  in  Twenty -ninth  Street 
locked  against  her,  and  she,  at  seventy- 
five,  on  the  street,  penniless,  and  without 
one  who  cared  for  her  in  all  the  world. 

Yes,  there  was  one.  A  dressmaker  who 
had  known  her  in  happier  days  saw  from  her 
window  opposite  Father  McGlynn's  church 
a  white-haired  woman  seek  shelter  within 
the  big  storm-doors  night  after  night  in  the 
bitter  cold  of  midwinter,  and  recognized  in 
her  the  once  proud  and  prosperous  Miss 
Kelly.  Shocked  and  grieved,  she  went 
to  the  district  office  of  the  Charities  with 
money  to  pay  for  shelter  and  begged  them 
to  take  the  old  lady  in  charge  and  save  her 
from  want. 

And  what  a  splendid  old  lady  she  was  ! 


LIFE'S  BEST  GIFT  35 

Famished  with  the  hunger  of  weeks  and 
months,  but  with  pride  undaunted,  straight 
as  an  arrow  under  the  burden  of  heavy 
years,  she  met  the  visitor  with  all  the 
dignity  of  a  queen.  The  deep  lines  of 
suffering  in  her  face  grew  deeper  as  she 
heard  her  message.  She  drew  the  poor 
black  alpaca  about  her  with  a  gesture  as  if 
she  were  warding  off  a  blow:  "Why,"  she 
asked,  "should  any  one  intrude  upon  her 
to  offer  aid  ?  She  had  not  asked  for  any- 
thing, and  was  not — "  she  faltered  a  bit, 
but  went  on  resolutely  —  "did  not  want 
anything." 

"Not  work?"  asked  her  caller,  gently. 
"Would  you  not  like  me  to  find  some  work 
for  you .?" 

A  sudden  light  came  into  the  old  eyes. 
"Work  —  yes,   if  she  could   get   that — " 


36  NEIGHBORS 

And  then  the  reserve  of  the  long,  lonely 
years  broke  down.  She  buried  her  face  in 
her  hands  and  wept. 

They  found  her  a  place  to  sew  in  a  house 
where  she  was  made  welcome  as  one  of  the 
family.  For  all  that,  she  went  reluctantly. 
All  her  stubborn  pride  went  down  before 
the  kindness  of  these  strangers.  She  was 
afraid  that  her  hand  had  lost  its  cunning, 
that  she  could  not  do  justice  to  what  was 
asked  of  her,  and  she  stipulated  that  she 
should  receive  only  a  dollar  for  her  day's 
work,  if  she  could  earn  that.  When  her 
employer  gave  her  the  dollar  at  the  end  of 
the  day,  the  look  that  came  into  her  face 
made  that  woman  turn  quickly  to  hide  her 
tears. 

The  worst  of  Margaret  Kelly's  hardships 
were  over.     She  had  a  roof  over  her  head, 


LIFE'S  BEST  GIFT  37 

and  an  "address."  If  she  starved,  that 
was  her  affair.  And  slowly  she  opened  her 
heart  to  her  new  friends  and  gave  them 
room  there.  I  have  a  letter  of  that  day 
from  one  of  them  that  tells  how  they  were 
getting  on :  "She  has  a  little  box  of  a  room 
where  she  almost  froze  all  winter.  A 
window  right  over  her  bed  and  no  heat. 
But  she  is  a  great  old  soldier  and  never 
.  whines.  Occasionally  she  comes  to  see  me, 
and  I  give  her  something  to  eat,  but  what 
she  does  between  times  God  alone  knows. 
When  I  give  her  a  little  change,  she  goes  to 
the  bake-shop,  but  I  think  otherwise  goes 
without  and  pretends  she  is  not  hungry. 
A  business  man  who  knows  her  told  her  if 
she  needed  nourishment  to  let  him  know; 
she  said  she  did  not  need  anything.  Her 
face  looks  starvation.     When   she  was  ill 


38  NEIGHBORS 

in  the  winter,  I  tried  to  get  her  into  a  hos- 
pital ;  but  she  would  not  go,  and  no  wonder. 
If  she  had  only  a  couple  of  dollars  a  week 
she  could  get  along,  as  I  could  get  her  cloth- 
ing.    She  wears  black  for  her  sister." 

The  couple  of  dollars  were  found  and  the 
hunger  was  banished  with  the  homelessness. 
Margaret  Kelly  had  two  days'  work  every 
week,  and  in  the  feeling  that  she  could  sup- 
port herself  once  more  new  life  came  to  her. 
She  was  content. 

So  two  years  passed.  In  the  second 
summer  the  old  woman,  now  nearing  eighty, 
was  sent  out  in  the  country  for  a  vacation  of 
five  or  six  weeks.  She  came  back  strong 
and  happy ;  the  rest  and  the  peace  had 
sunk  into  her  soul.  "  Some  of  the  tragedy 
has  gone  out  of  her  face,"  her  friend  wrote 
to    me.     She    was    looking    forward    with 


LIFE'S  BEST  GIFT  39 

courage  to  taking  up  her  work  again  when 
what  seemed  an  unusual  opportunity  came 
her  way.  A  woman  who  knew  her  story 
was  going  abroad,  leaving  her  home  up  near 
Riverside  Drive  in  charge  of  a  caretaker. 
She  desired  a  companion  for  her,  and  offered 
the  place  to  Miss  Kelly.  It  was  so  much 
better  a  prospect  than  the  cold  and  cheer- 
less hall  room  that  her  friends  advised  her 
to  accept,  and  Margaret  Kelly  moved  into 
the  luxurious  stone  house  uptown,  and  once 
more  was  warmly  and  snugly  housed  for 
the  winter  with  congenial  company. 

Man  proposes  and  God  disposes.  Along 
in  February  came  a  deadly  cold  spell. 
The  thermometer  fell  below  zero.  In  the 
worst  of  it  Miss  Kelly's  friend  from  the 
"office,"  happening  that  way,  rang  the  bell 
to  inquire  how  she  was  getting  on.     No 


40  NEIGHBORS 

one  answered.  She  knocked  at  the  base- 
ment door,  but  received  no  reply.  Con- 
cluding that  the  two  women  were  in  an 
upper  story  out  of  hearing  of  the  bell,  she 
went  away,  and  on  her  return  later  in  the 
day  tried  again,  with  no  better  success. 
It  was  too  cold  for  the  people  in  the  house 
to  be  out,  and  her  suspicions  were  aroused. 
She  went  to  the  police  station  and  returned 
with  help.  The  door  was  forced  and  the 
house  searched.  In  the  kitchen  they  found 
the  two  old  women  sitting  dead  by  the  stove, 
one  with  her  head  upon  the  other's  shoulder. 
The  fire  had  long  been  out  and  their  bodies 
were  frozen.  There  was  plenty  of  fuel  in 
the  house.  Apparently  they  had  shut  off 
the  draught  to  save  coal  and  raised  the  lid 
of  the  stove,  perhaps  to  enjoy  the  glow  of 
the   fire   in   the   gloaming.     The   escaping 


LIFE'S  BEST  GIFT  41 

gas  had  put  them  both  to  sleep  before  they 
knew  their  peril. 

So  the  police  and  the  coroner  concluded. 
"Two  friends,"  said  the  official  report. 
Margaret  Kelly  had  found  more  than  food 
and  shelter.  Life  at  the  last  had  given  her 
its  best  gift,  and  her  hungry  old  heart  was 
filled. 


DRIVEN   FROM  HOME 

"Doctor,  what  shall  I  do?  My  father 
wants  me  to  tend  bar  on  Sunday.  I  am 
doing  it  nights,  but  Sunday  —  I  don't 
want  to.     What  shall  I  do  ?" 

The  pastor  of  Olivet  Church  looked 
kindly  at  the  lad  who  stood  before  him, 
cap  in  hand.  The  last  of  the  Sunday- 
school  had  trailed  out ;  the  boy  had  waited 
for  this  opportunity.  Dr.  Schauffler  knew 
and  liked  him  as  one  of  his  bright  boys. 
He  knew,  too,  his  home  —  the  sordid,  hard- 
fisted  German  father  and  his  patient,  long- 
suffering  mother. 

"What  do  you  think  yourself,  Karl?" 

*'I  don't  want  to,  Doctor.  I  know  it  is 
wrong." 

42 


DRIVEN   FROM  HOME  43 

"All  right  then,  don't." 

"But  he  will  kick  me  out  and  never  take 
me  back.     He  told  me  so,  and  he'll  do  it." 

"Well  —  " 

The  boy's  face  flushed.  At  fourteen,  to 
decide  between  home  and  duty  is  not  easy. 
And  there  was  his  mother.  Knowing  him, 
the  Doctor  let  him  fight  it  out  alone.  Pres- 
ently he  squared  his  shoulders  as  one  who 
has  made  his  choice. 

"I  can't  help  it  if  he  does,"  he  said ;  "  it 
isn't  right  to  ask  me." 

"If  he  does,  come  straight  here.  Good- 
by!" 

Sunday  night  the  door-bell  of  the  pastor's 
study  rang  sharply.  The  Doctor  laid  down 
his  book  and  answered  it  himself.  On  the 
threshold  stood  Karl  with  a  small  bundle 
done  up  in  a  bandana  handkerchief. 


44  NEIGHBORS 

"Well,  I  am  fired,"  he  said. 

"Come  in,  then.     I'll  see  you  through." 

The  boy  brought  in  his  bundle.  It  con- 
tained a  shirt,  three  collars,  and  a  pair  of 
socks,  hastily  gathered  up  in  his  retreat. 
The  Doctor  hefted  it. 

"Going  light,"  he  smiled.  "Men  fight 
better  for  it  sometimes.  Great  battles 
have  been  won  without  baggage  trains." 

The  boy  looked  soberly  at  his  all. 

"I  have  got  to  win  now,  Doctor.  Get  me 
a  job,  will  you  ?  " 

Things  moved  swiftly  with  Karl  from  that 
Sunday.  Monday  morning  saw  him  at 
work  as  errand-boy  in  an  office,  earning 
enough  for  his  keep  at  the  boarding-house 
where  his  mother  found  him  at  times  when 
his  father  was  alone  keeping  bar.  That 
night  he  registered  at  the  nearest  evening 


DRIVEN   FROM  HOME  45 

school  to  complete  his  course.  The  Doctor 
kept  a  grip  on  his  studies,  as  he  had  prom- 
ised, and  saw  him  through.  It  was  not 
easy  sledding,  but  it  was  better  than  the 
smelly  saloon.  From  the  public  school  he 
graduated  into  the  Cooper  Institute,  where 
his  teachers  soon  took  notice  of  the  wide- 
awake lad.  Karl  was  finding  himself.  He 
took  naturally  to  the  study  of  languages,  and 
threw  himself  into  it  with  all  the  ardor  of  an 
army  marching  without  baggage  train  to 
meet  an  enemy.  He  had  "got  to  win,"  and 
he  did.  All  the  while  he  earned  his  living 
working  as  a  clerk  by  day — with  very  little 
baggage  yet  to  boast  of  —  and  sitting  up 
nights  with  his  books.  When  he  graduated 
from  the  Institute,  the  battle  was  half  won. 
The  other  half  he  fought  on  his  own 
ground,  with  the  enemy's  tents  in  sight. 


46  NEIGHBORS 

His  attainments  procured  for  him  a  place  in 
the  Lenox  Library,  where  his  opportunity 
for  reading  was  Hmited  only  by  his  ambi- 
tion. He  made  American  history  and  liter- 
ature his  special  study,  and  in  the  course  of 
time  achieved  great  distinction  in  his  field. 
*'And  they  were  married  and  lived  happily 
ever  after"  might  by  right  be  added  to  his 
story.  He  did  marry  an  East  Side  girl 
who  had  been  his  sweetheart  while  he  was 
fighting  his  uphill  battle,  and  they  have 
to-day  two  daughters  attending  college. 

It  is  the  drawback  to  these  stories  that, 
being  true,  they  must  respect  the  privacy  of 
their  heroes.  If  that  were  not  so,  I  should 
tell  you  that  this  hero's  name  is  not  Karl, 
but  one  much  better  befitting  his  fight  and 
his  victory ;  that  he  was  chosen  historian  of 
his  home  State,  and  held  the  office  with 


DRIVEN   FROM  HOME  47 

credit  until  spoils  politics  thrust  him  aside, 
and  that  he  lives  to-day  in  the  capital  city  of 
another  State,  an  authority  whose  word  is 
not  lightly  questioned  on  any  matter  per- 
taining to  Americana.  That  is  the  record 
of  the  East  Side  boy  who  was  driven  from 
home  for  refusing  to  tend  bar  in  his  father's 
saloon  on  Sunday  because  it  was  not  right. 

He  never  saw  his  father  again.  He  tried 
more  than  once,  but  the  door  of  his  home 
was  barred  against  him.  Not  with  his 
mother's  consent ;  in  long  after  years,  when 
once  again  Dr.  Schauffler  preached  at 
Olivet,  a  little  German  woman  came  up 
after  the  sermon  and  held  out  her  hand  to 
him. 

"You  made  my  Karl  a  man,"  she  said. 

"No,"  replied  the  preacher,  soberly, 
"God  made  him." 


THE  PROBLEM  OF  THE  WIDOW 
SALVINI 

The  mere  mention  of  the  widow  Salvini 
always  brings  before  me  that  other  widow 
who  came  to  our  settlement  when  her 
rascal  husband  was  dead  after  beating  her 
black  and  blue  through  a  lifetime  in  Poverty 
Gap,  during  which  he  did  his  best  to  make 
ruffians  of  the  boys  and  worse  of  the  girls 
by  driving  them  out  into  the  street  to  earn 
money  to  buy  him  rum  whenever  he  was 
not  on  the  Island,  which,  happily,  he  was 
most  of  the  time.  I  know  I  had  a  hand  in 
sending  him  there  nineteen  times,  more 
shame  to  the  judge  whom  I  finally  had  to 
threaten  with  public  arraignment  and  the 

48 


THE   WIDOW  SALVINI'S   PROBLEM     49 

certainty  of  being  made  an  accessory  to 
wife-murder  unless  he  found  a  way  of  keep- 
ing him  there.  He  did  then,  and  it  was 
during  his  long  term  that  the  fellow  died. 
What  I  started  to  say  was  that,  when  all 
was  over  and  he  out  of  the  way,  his  widow 
came  in  and  wanted  our  advice  as  to  whether 
she  ought  to  wear  mourning  earrings  in 
his  memory.  Without  rhyme  or  reason 
the  two  are  associated  in  my  mind,  for  they 
were  as  different  as  could  be.  The  widow 
of  Poverty  Gap  was  Irish  and  married  to  a 
brute.  Mrs.  Salvini  was  an  Italian;  her 
husband  was  a  hard-working  fellow  who 
had  the  misfortune  to  be  killed  on  the  rail- 
way. The  point  of  contact  is  in  the  ear- 
rings. The  widow  Salvini  did  wear  mourn- 
ing earrings,  a  little  piece  of  crape  draped 
over  the  gold  bangles  of  her  care-free  girl- 


50  NEIGHBORS 

hood,  and  it  was  not  funny  but  infinitely 
touching.  It  just  shows  how  little  things 
do  twist  one's  mind. 

Signor  Salvini  was  one  of  a  gang  of  track- 
men employed  by  the  New  York  Central 
Railroad.  He  was  killed  when  they  had 
been  in  America  two  years,  and  left  his  wife 
with  two  little  children  and  one  unborn. 
There  was  a  Workmen's  Compensation  Law 
at  the  time  under  which  she  would  have 
been  entitled  to  recover  a  substantial  sum, 
some  $1800,  upon  proof  that  he  was  not 
himself  grossly  to  blame,  and  suit  was 
brought  in  her  name ;  but  before  it  came 
up  the  Court  of  Appeals  declared  the  act 
unconstitutional.  The  railway  offered  her 
a  hundred  dollars,  but  Mrs.  Salvini's  law- 
yer refused,  and  the  matter  took  its  slow 
course  through  the  courts.     No  doubt  the 


THE  WIDOW  SALVINI'S  PROBLEM     51 

company  considered  that  the  business  had 
been  properly  dealt  with.  It  is  quite 
possible  that  its  well-fed  and  entirely 
respectable  directors  went  home  from  the 
meeting  at  which  counsel  made  his  report 
with  an  injured  feeling  of  generosity  unap- 
preciated —  they  were  not  legally  bound 
to  do  anything.  In  which  they  were  right. 
Signor  Salvini  in  life  had  belonged  to  a 
benefit  society  of  good  intentions  but  poor 
business  ways.  It  had  therefore  become 
defunct  at  the  time  of  his  death.  However, 
its  members  considered  their  moral  obliga- 
tions and  pitied  the  widow.  They  were  all 
poor  workingmen,  but  they  dug  down  into 
their  pockets  and  raised  two  hundred  dollars 
for  the  stricken  family.  When  the  under- 
taker and  the  cemetery  and  the  other 
civilizing  agencies  that  take  toll  of  our  dead 


52  NEIGHBORS 

were  paid,   there  was  left  twenty  dollars 
for  the  widow  to  begin  life  with  anew. 

When  that  weary  autumn  day  had  worn 
to  an  end,  the  lingering  traces  of  the  death 
vigil  been  removed,  the  two  bare  rooms  set 
to  rights,  and  the  last  pitying  neighbor 
woman  gone  to  her  own,  the  widow  sat  with 
her  dumb  sorrow  by  her  slumbering  little 
ones,  and  faced  the  future  with  which  she 
was  to  battle  alone.  Just  what  advice  the 
directors  of  the  railway  that  had  killed  her 
husband  —  harsh  words,  but  something 
may  be  allowed  the  bitterness  of  such  grief 
as  hers  —  would  have  given  then,  sur- 
rounded by  their  own  sheltered  ones  at 
their  happy  firesides,  I  don't  know.  And 
yet  one  might  venture  a  safe  guess  if  only 
some  kind  spirit  could  have  brought  them 
face  to  face  in  that  hour.     But  it  is  a  long 


THE  WIDOW  SALVINI'S  PROBLEM     53 

way  from  Madison  Avenue  to  the  poor 
tenements  of  the  Bronx,  and  even  farther 
—  pity  our  poor  limping  democracy  !  — 
from  the  penniless  Italian  widow  to  her 
sister  in  the  fashionable  apartment.  As  a 
household  servant  in  the  latter  the  widow 
Salvini  would  have  been  a  sad  misfit  even 
without  the  children;  she  would  have 
owned  that  herself.  Her  mistress  would 
not  have  been  likely  to  have  more  patience 
with  her.  And  so  that  door  through  which 
the  two  might  have  met  to  their  mutual 
good  was  closed.  There  were  of  course 
the  homes  for  the  little  ones,  toward  the 
support  of  which  the  apartment  paid  its 
share  in  the  tax  bills.  The  thought  crossed 
the  mind  of  their  mother  as  she  sat  there, 
but  at  the  sight  of  little  Louisa  and  Vin- 
cenzo,   the   baby,  sleeping   peacefully  side 


54  NEIGHBORS 

by  side,  she  put  it  away  with  a  gesture  of 
impatience.  It  was  enough  to  lose  their 
father;  these  she  would  keep.  And  she 
crossed  herself  as  she  bowed  reverently 
toward  the  print  of  the  Blessed  Virgin, 
before  which  burned  a  devout  little  taper. 
Surely,  She  knew  ! 

It  came  into  her  mind  as  she  sat  thinking 
her  life  out  that  she  had  once  learned  to 
crochet  the  fine  lace  of  her  native  town,  and 
that  she  knew  of  a  woman  in  the  next  block 
who  sold  it  to  the  rich  Americans.  Making 
sure  that  the  children  were  sound  asleep, 
she  turned  down  the  lamp,  threw  her  shawl 
over  her  head,  and  went  to  seek  her. 

The  lace  woman  examined  the  small 
sample  of  her  old  skill  which  she  had 
brought,  and  promised  to  buy  what  she 
made.     But  she  was  not  herself  the  seller, 


THE  WIDOW  SALVINI'S  PROBLEM     55 

and  the  price  she  got  was  very  low.  She 
could  pay  even  less.  Unaccustomed  fingers 
would  not  earn  much  at  lace-making; 
everything  depended  on  being  quick  at 
it.  But  the  widow  knew  nothing  else.  It 
was  at  least  work,  and  she  went  home  to 
take  up  the  craft  of  her  half-forgotten 
youth. 

But  it  was  one  thing  to  ply  her  needle 
with  deft  young  fingers  and  the  songs  of 
sunny  Italy  in  her  ears,  when  the  world  and 
its  tasks  were  but  play;  another  to  bait 
grim  poverty  with  so  frail  a  weapon  in  a 
New  York  tenement,  with  the  landlord  to 
pay  and  hungry  children  to  feed.  At  the 
end  of  the  week,  when  she  brought  the 
product  of  her  toil  to  the  lace  woman,  she 
received  in  payment  thirty  cents.  It  was 
all  she  had  made,  she  was  told. 


56  NEIGHBORS 

There  was  still  the  bigger  part  of  her  little 
hoard ;  but  one  more  rent  day,  and  that 
would  be  gone.  Thirty  cents  a  week  does 
not  feed  three  mouths,  even  with  the  thou- 
sand little  makeshifts  of  poverty  that  con- 
stitute its  resources.  The  good-hearted 
woman  next  door  found  a  spare  potato  or 
two  for  the  children ;  the  neighbor  across 
the  hall,  when  she  had  corned  beef  for 
dinner,  brought  her  the  water  it  was  boiled 
in  for  soup.  But  though  neighbors  were 
kind,  making  lace  was  business,  like  run- 
ning a  railway,  and  its  rule  was  the  same  — 
to  buy  cheap,  lives  or  lace,  and  sell  dear. 
It  developed,  moreover,  that  the  industry 
was  sweated  down  to  the  last  cent.  There 
was  a  whole  string  of  women  between  the 
seller  and  the  widow  at  the  end  of  the  line, 
who  each  gave  up  part  of  her  poor  earnings 


THE  WIDOW  SALVINI'S  PROBLEM     57 

to  the  one  next  ahead  as  her  patron,  or 
padrone.  The  widow  Salvini  reduced  the 
chain  of  her  industrial  slavery  by  one  link 
when  she  quit  making  lace. 

Upstairs  in  the  tenement  was  a  woman 
who  made  willow  plumes,  that  were  just 
then  the  fashion.  To  her  went  the  widow 
with  the  prayer  that  she  teach  her  the  busi- 
ness, since  she  must  work  at  home  to  take 
care  of  her  children ;  and  the  other  good- 
naturedly  gave  her  a  seat  at  her  table  and 
showed  her  the  simple  grips  of  her  trade. 
Simple  enough  they  were,  but  demanding 
an  intensity  of  application,  attention  that 
never  flagged,  and  deft  manipulation  in 
making  the  tiny  knots  that  tie  the  vanes 
of  the  feather  together  and  make  the  droop 
of  the  plume.  Faithfully  as  she  strove,  the 
most  she  could  make  was  three  inches  in  a 


58  NEIGHBORS 

day.  The  price  paid  was  eleven  cents  an 
inch.  Thirty -three  cents  a  day  was  better 
than  thirty  cents  a  week,  but  still  a  long 
way  from  the  minimum  wage  we  hear 
about.  It  was  then,  when  her  little  margin 
was  all  gone  and  the  rent  due  again,  that 
the  baby  came.  And  with  it  came  the 
charity  workers,  to  back  the  helpful  neigh- 
borliness  of  the  tenement  that  had  never 
failed. 

When  she  was  able  to  be  about  again,  she 
went  back  to  her  task  of  making  plumes. 
But  the  work  went  slower  than  before. 
The  baby  needed  attention,  and  there  were 
the  beds  to  make  and  the  washing  for  two 
lodgers,  who  paid  the  rent  and  to  whom  the 
charity  workers  closed  their  eyes  even  if 
they  had  not  directly  connived  at  procur- 
ing them.     It  is  thus   that  the  grim   facts 


THE   WIDOW  SALVINFS  PROBLEM     59 

of  poverty  set  at  naught  all  the  benevolent 
purposes  of  those  who  fight  it.  It  had 
forced  upon  the  widow  home-work  and  the 
lodger,  two  curses  of  the  tenement,  and  now 
it  added  the  third  in  child  labor.  Little 
Louisa's  .fingers  were  nimbler  than  her 
mother's.  She  was  only  eight,  but  she 
learned  soon  to  tie  a  plume  as  well  as  the 
mother.  The  charity  visitor,  who  had 
all  the  economic  theories  at  her  fingers' 
ends  and  knew  their  soundness  only  too 
well,  stood  by  and  saw  her  do  it,  and  found 
it  neither  in  her  heart  nor  in  her  reason  to 
object,  for  was  she  not  struggling  to  keep 
her  family  together  ?  Five-year-old  Vin- 
cenzo  watched  them  work. 

"Could  he  make  a  plume,  too.^"  she 
asked,  with  a  sudden  sinking  of  the  heart. 
Yes,  but  not  so  fast ;    his  wee  hands  grew 


60  NEIGHBORS 

tired  so  soon.  And  the  widow  let  him  show 
how  he  could  tie  the  little  strange  knot. 
The  baby  rolled  on  the  floor,  crooning  and 
sucking  the  shears. 

In  spite  of  the  reenforcement,  the  work 
lagged.  The  widow's  eyes  were  giving  out 
and  she  grew  more  tired  every  day  Four 
days  the  three  had  labored  over  one  plume, 
and  finished  it  at  last.  To-morrow  she 
would  take  it  to  the  factory  and  receive 
for  it  ninety  cents.  But  even  this  scant 
wage  was  threatened.  Willow  plumes  were 
going  out  of  fashion,  and  the  harassed 
mother  would  have  to  make  another  start. 
At  what  ? 

The  question  was  answered  a  month  later 
as  it  must,  not  as  it  should  be,  when  to  the 
three  failures  of  the  plan  of  well-ordered 
philanthropy  was  added  the  fourth  :  Louisa 


THE  WIDOW  SALVINI'S  PROBLEM     61 

and  Vincenzo  were  put  in  the  "college,"  as 
the  Italians  call  the  orphan  asylum.  The 
charity  workers  put  them  there  in  order  that 
they  might  have  proper  food  and  enough  of 
it.  Willow  plumes  having  become  a  drug 
in  the  market,  the  widow  went  into  a 
factory,  paying  a  neighbor  in  the  tenement 
a  few  cents  a  day  for  taking  care  of  the  baby 
in  her  absence.  As  an  unskilled  hand  she 
was  able  to  earn  a  bare  living.  One  poor 
home,  that  was  yet  a  happy  home  once,  was 
wiped  out.  The  widow's  claim  against  the 
railway  company  still  waits  upon  the  court 
calendar.^ 

Such  as  it  is,  it  is  society's  present  solu- 
tion of  the  problem  of  the  widow  Salvini. 
If  any  find  fault  with  it,  let  them  not  blame 
the  charity  workers,  for  they  did  what  they 

^Her  claim  has  since  been  settled  for  $1000. 


62  NEIGHBORS 

could ;  nor  the  railway  company,  for  its 
ways  are  the  ways  of  business,  not  of  phil- 
anthropy ;  nor  our  highest  court,  for  we  are 
told  that  impious  is  the  hand  that  is 
stretched  forth  toward  that  ark  of  the 
covenant  of  our  liberties.  Let  them  put 
the  blame  where  it  belongs  —  upon  us  all 
who  for  thirty  years  have  been  silent  under 
the  decision  which  forbade  the  abolition  of 
industrial  slavery  in  the  Bohemian  cigar- 
makers'  tenements  because  it  would  inter- 
fere with  *'the  sacredness  and  hallowed 
associations  of  the  people's  homes."  That 
was  the  exact  phrase,  if  memory  serves  me 
right.  Such  was  the  sowing  of  our  crop 
of  social  injustice.  Shall  a  man  gather 
figs  from  thistles  ? 


PETER 

Miss  Wald  of  the  Nurses'  Settlement 
told  me  the  story  of  Peter,  and  I  set  it  down 
here  as  I  remember  it.  She  will  forgive 
the  slips.  Peter  has  nothing  to  forgive; 
rather,  he  would  not  have  were  he  alive. 
He  was  all  to  the  good  for  the  friendship  he 
gave  and  took.  Looking  at  it  across  the 
years,  it  seems  as  if  in  it  were  the  real  Peter. 
The  other,  who  walked  around,  was  a  poor 
knave  of  a  pretender. 

This  was  Miss  Wald's  story  :  — 

He  came  to  me  with  the  card  of  one  of 

our  nurses,  a  lanky,  slipshod  sort  of  fellow 

of  nineteen  or  thereabouts.     The  nurse  had 

run   across    him    begging   in    a   tenement. 

63 


64  NEIGHBORS 

When  she  asked  him  why  he  did  that,  he 
put  a  question  himself:  "Where  would  a 
fellow  beg  if  not  among  the  poor  ? "  And 
now  there  he  stood,  indifferent,  bored  if 
anything,  shiftless,  yet  with  some  indefinite 
appeal,  waiting  to  see  what  I  would  do. 
She  had  told  him  that  he  had  better  go  and 
see  me,  and  he  had  come.  He  had  done  his 
part ;  it  was  up  to  me  now. 

He  was  a  waiter,  he  said,  used  to  working 
South  in  the  winter,  but  it  was  then  too  late. 
He  had  been  ill.  He  suppressed  a  little 
hacking  cough  that  told  its  own  story ;  he 
was  a  "lunger."  Did  he  tramp  ?  Yes,  he 
said,  and  I  noticed  that  his  breath  smelled 
of  whisky.  He  made  no  attempt  to  hide 
the  fact. 

I  explained  to  him  that  I  might  send  him 
to  some  place  in  the  country  where  he  could 


r 


/r.r-.f  V.V. 


THERE   HE   STOOD,    INDIFFERENT,    BORED   IF   ANYTHING, 
SHIFTLESS." 


PETER  65 

get  better  during  the  winter,  but  that  it 
would  be  so  much  effort  wasted  if  he  drank. 
He  considered  a  while,  and  nodded  in  his 
curious  detached  way ;  he  guessed  he  could 
manage  without  it,  if  he  had  plenty  of  hot 
coffee.  The  upshot  of  it  was  that  he  ac- 
cepted my  condition  and  went. 

Along  in  midwinter  our  door-bell  was 
rung  one  night,  and  there  stood  Peter. 
"Oh!  did  you  come  back.^  Too  bad!" 
It  slipped  out  before  I  had  time  to  think. 
But  Peter  bore  with  me.  He  smiled  reas- 
surance. *'I  did  not  run  av/ay.  The  place 
burned  down ;   we  were  sent  back.'* 

It  was  true;  I  remembered.  But  the 
taint  of  whisky  was  on  his  breath.  "You 
have  been  drinking  again,"  I  fretted. 
"You  spent  your  money  for  that — " 

"No,"  said  he;    "a  man  treated  me." 


66  NEIGHBORS 

"And  did  you  have  to  take  whisky?'* 

There  was  no  trace  of  resentment  in  his 
retort :  *'  Well,  now,  what  would  he  have 
said  if  I'd  took  milk?"  It  was  as  one 
humoring  a  child. 

He  went  South  on  a  waiter  job.  From 
St.  Augustine  he  sent  me  a  letter  that 
ended :  "  Write  me  in  care  of  the  post- 
office  ;  it  is  the  custom  of  the  town  to  get 
your  letters  there."  Likely  it  was  the  first 
time  in  his  life  that  he  had  had  a  mail 
address.  "This  is  a  very  nice  place,"  ran 
his  comment  on  the  old  Spanish  town, 
"but  for  business  give  me  New  York." 

The  Wanderlust  gripped  Peter,  and  I 
heard  from  him  next  in  the  Southwest.  For 
years  letters  came  from  him  at  long  inter- 
vals, showing  that  he  had  not  forgotten  me. 
Once   another   tramp   called   on   me   with 


PETER  67 

greeting  from  him  and  a  request  for  shoes. 
When  "business"  next  took  Peter  to  New 
York  and  he  called,  I  told  him  that  I  valued 
his  acquaintance,  but  did  not  care  for  that 
of  many  more  tramps.  He  knew  the  man 
at  once. 

"Oh,"  he  said,  "isn't  he  a  rotter.^  I 
didn't  think  he  would  do  that."  They  were 
tramping  in  Colorado,  he  explained,  and  one 
night  the  other  man  told  him  of  his  mother. 
Peter,  in  the  intimacy  of  the  camp-fire, 
spoke  of  me.  The  revelation  of  the  other's 
baseness  was  like  the  betrayal  of  some 
sacred  rite.  I  would  not  have  liked  to  be  in 
the  man's  place  when  next  they  met,  if  they 
ever  did. 

Some  months  passed,  and  then  one  day  a 
message  came  from  St.  Joseph's  Home  :  "I 
guess  I  am  up  against  it  this  time."     He  did 


68  NEIGHBORS 

not  want  to  trouble  me,  but  would  I  come 
and  say  good-by  ?  I  went  at  once.  Peter 
was  dying,  and  he  knew  it.  Sitting  by  his 
bed,  my  mind  went  back  to  our  first  meet- 
ing —  perhaps  his  did  too  —  and  I  said  : 
*'You  have  been  real  decent  several  times, 
Peter.  You  must  have  come  of  good 
people;  don't  you  want  me  to  find  them 
for  you  ? "  He  didn't  seem  to  care  very 
much,  but  at  last  he  gave  me  the  address 
in  Boston  of  his  only  sister.  But  she  had 
moved,  and  it  was  a  long  and  toilsome 
task  to  find  her.  In  the  end,  however, 
a  friend  located  her  for  me.  She  was  a 
poor  Irish  dressmaker,  and  Peter's  old 
father  lived  with  her.  She  wrote  in  an- 
swer to  my  summons  that  they  would 
come,  if  Peter  wanted  them  very  much, 
but    that    it    would    be    a    sacrifice.     He 


PETER  69 

had  always  been  their  great  trial  —  a 
born  tramp   and  idler. 

Peter  was  chewing  a  straw  when  I  told 
him.  I  had  come  none  too  soon.  His 
face  told  me  that.  He  heard  me  out  in 
silence.  When  I  asked  if  he  wanted  me 
to  send  for  them,  he  stopped  chewing  a 
while  and  ruminated. 

"They  might  send  me  the  money  in- 
stead," he  decided,  and  resumed  his  straw. 


KA^TE'S  CHOICE 

My  winter  lecture  travels  sometimes 
bring  me  to  a  town  not  a  thousand  miles 
from  New  York,  where  my  mail  awaits  me. 
If  it  happens  then,  as  it  often  does,  that 
it  is  too  heavy  for  me  to  attack  alone  — 
for  it  is  the  law  that  if  a  man  live  by  the 
pen  he  shall  pay  the  penalty  in  kind  —  I 
send  for  a  stenographer,  and  in  response 
there  comes  a  knock  at  my  door  that 
ushers  in  a  smiling  young  woman,  who 
answers  my  inquiries  after  *' Grandma" 
with  the  assurance  that  she  is  very  well 
indeed,  though  she  is  getting  older  every 
day.  As  to  her,  I  can  see  for  myself 
that   she   is   fine,   and   I   wonder   secretly 

70 


KATE'S  CHOICE  71 

where  the  young  men's  eyes  are  that  she 
is  still  Miss  Murray.  Before  I  leave  town, 
unless  the  train  table  is  very  awkward,  I 
am  sure  to  call  on  Grandma  for  a  chat 
—  in  office  hours,  for  then  the  old  lady 
will  exhibit  to  me  with  unreserved  pride 
"the  child's"  note-book,  with  the  pot- 
hooks which  neither  of  us  can  make  out, 
and  tell  me  what  a  wonderful  girl  she  is. 
And  I  cry  out  with  the  old  soul  in  rapture 
over  it  all,  and  go  away  feeling  happily 
that  the  world  is  all  right  with  two  such 
people  in  it  as  Kate  Murray  and  her  grand- 
mother, though  the  one  is  but  a  plain 
stenographer  and  the  other  an  old  Irish- 
woman, but  with  the  faithful,  loving  heart 
of  her  kind.  To  me  there  is  no  better 
kind  anywhere,  and  Grandma  Linton  is 
the  type  as  she  is  the  flower  of  it.     So 


72  NEIGHBORS 

that  you  shall  agree  with  me  I  will  tell 
you  their  story,  her  story  and  the  child's, 
exactly  as  they  have  lived  it,  except  that 
I  will  not  tell  you  the  name  of  the  town 
they  live  in  or  their  own  true  names,  be- 
cause Kate  herself  does  not  know  all  of 
it,  and  it  is  best  that  she  shall  not  —  yet. 
When  I  say  at  the  very  outset  that 
Margaret  Linton,  Kate's  mother,  was 
Margaret  Linton  all  her  brief  sad  life, 
you  know  the  reason  why,  and  there  is  no 
need  of  saying  more.  She  was  a  brave, 
good  girl,  innocent  as  she  was  handsome. 
At  nineteen  she  was  scrubbing  offices  to 
save  her  widowed  mother,  whom  rheuma- 
tism had  crippled.  That  was  how  she  met 
the  young  man  who  made  love  to  her,  and 
listened  to  his  false  promises,  as  girls  have 
done  since  time  out  of  mind  to  their  un- 


KATE'S   CHOICE  73 

doing.  She  was  nineteen  when  her  baby 
was  born.  From  that  day,  as  long  as  she 
lived,  no  word  of  reproach  fell  from  her 
mother's  lips.  "My  Maggie"  was  more 
than  ever  the  pride  of  the  widow's  heart 
since  the  laughter  had  died  in  her  bonny 
eyes.  It  was  as  if  in  the  fatherless  child 
the  strongest  of  all  bonds  had  come  between 
the  two  silent  women.  Poor  Margaret 
closed  her  eyes  with  the  promise  of  her 
mother  that  she  would  never  forsake  her 
baby,  and  went  to  sleep  with  a  tired  little 
sigh. 

Kate  was  three  years  old  when  her 
mother  died.  It  was  no  time  then  for 
Grandma  Linton  to  be  bothered  with  the 
rheumatics.  It  was  one  thing  to  be  a 
worn  old  woman  with  a  big  strong  daughter 
to  do  the  chores  for  you,   quite  another 


74  NEIGHBORS 

to  have  this  young  Hfe  crying  out  to  you 
for  food  and  shelter  and  care,  a  winsome 
elf  putting  two  plump  little  arms  around 
one's  neck  and  whispering  with  her  mouth 
close  to  your  ear,  "I  love  oo,  Grannie." 
With  the  music  of  the  baby  voice  in  her 
ears  the  widow  girded  up  her  loins  and 
went  out  scrubbing,  cleaning,  became 
janitress  of  the  tenement  in  which  she 
and  Kate  occupied  a  two-room  flat  —  any- 
thing so  that  the  thorns  should  be  plucked 
from  the  path  of  the  child's  blithesome 
feet.  Seven  years  she  strove  for  her 
"lamb."  When  Kate  was  ten  and  getting 
to  be  a  big  girl,  she  faced  the  fact  that 
she  could  do  it  no  longer.  She  was  get- 
ting too  old. 

What    struggles    it   cost,    knowing   her, 
I  can  guess;    but  she  brought  that  sacri- 


KATE'S  CHOICE  75 

fice  too.  Friends  who  were  good  to  the 
poor  undertook  to  pay  the  rent.  She 
could  earn  enough  to  keep  them;  that 
she  knew.  But  they  soon  heard  that  the 
two  were  starving.  Poor  neighbors  were 
sharing  their  meals  with  them,  who  them- 
selves had  scarce  enough  to  go  around; 
and  from  Kate's  school  came  the  report 
that  she  was  underfed.  Her  grand- 
mother's haggard  face  told  the  same  story 
plainly.  There  was  still  the  "county" 
where  no  one  starves,  however  else  she 
fares,  and  they  tried  to  make  her  see  that 
it  was  her  duty  to  give  up  and  let  the 
child  be  cared  for  in  an  institution.  But 
against  that  Grandma  Linton  set  her  face 
like  flint.  She  was  her  Maggie's  own, 
and  stay  with  her  she  would,  as  she  had 
promised,  as  long  as  she  could  get  around 


•re  NEIGHBORS 

at  all.  And  with  that  she  reached  for 
her  staff  —  her  old  enemy,  the  rheumat- 
ics, was  just  then  getting  in  its  worst 
twinges,  as  if  to  mock  her  —  and  set  out 
to  take  up  her  work. 

But  it  was  all  a  vain  pretense,  and  her 
friends  knew  it.  They  were  at  their  wits' 
end  until  it  occurred  to  them  to  lump 
two  families  in  one.  There  was  another 
widow,  a  younger  woman  with  four  small 
children,  the  youngest  a  baby,  who 
was  an  unsolved  problem  to  them.  The 
mother  had  work,  and  was  able  to  do  it; 
but  she  could  not  be  spared  from  home 
as  things  were.  They  brought  the  two 
women  together.  They  liked  one  another, 
and  took  eagerly  to  the  "club"  plan.  In 
the  compact  that  was  made  Mrs.  Linton 
became  the  housekeeper  of  the   common 


KATE'S  CHOICE  77 

home,  with  five  children  to  care  for  instead 
of  one,  while  the  mother  of  the  young 
brood  was  set  free  to  earn  the  living  for 
the  household. 

Mother  Linton  took  up  her  new  and 
congenial  task  with  the  whole-hearted 
devotion  with  which  she  had  carried  out 
her  promise  to  Maggie.  She  mothered 
the  family  of  untaught  children  and 
brought  them  up  as  her  own.  They  had 
been  running  wild,  but  grew  well-man- 
nered and  attractive,  to  her  great  pride. 
They  soon  accepted  her  as  their  veri- 
table "grannie,"  and  they  call  her  that 
to  this  day. 

The  years  went  by,  and  Kate,  out  of 
short  skirts,  got  her  "papers"  at  the 
school  and  went  forth  to  learn  typewrit- 
ing.    She    wanted    her    own    home    then. 


78  NEIGHBORS 

and  the  partnership  which  had  proved 
so  mutually  helpful  was  dissolved.  Kate 
was  getting  along  well,  with  steady  work 
in  an  office,  when  the  great  crisis  came. 
Grandma  became  so  feeble  that  their 
friends  once  more  urged  her  removal  to 
an  institution,  where  she  could  be  made 
comfortable,  instead  of  having  to  make 
a  home  for  her  granddaughter.  When, 
as  before,  she  refused  to  hear  of  it,  they 
tried  to  bring  things  to  a  head  by  refus- 
ing any  longer  to  contribute  toward  the 
rent.  They  did  it  with  fear  and  trem- 
bling, but  they  did  not  know  those  two, 
after  all.  The  day  notice  had  been  given 
Kate  called  at  the  office. 

She  came  to  thank  her  friends  for  their 
help  in  the  past.  It  was  all  right  for 
them  to  stop  now,  she  said;    it  was  her 


KATE'S  CHOICE  79 

turn.  "Grandma  took  care  of  me  when 
I  was  a  little  girl  for  years ;  now  I  can 
take  care  of  her.  I  am  earning  five  dollars 
a  week;  that  is  more  than  when  you  first 
helped  us,  and  I  shall  soon  get  a  raise. 
Grannie  and  I  will  move  into  other  rooms 
that  are  not  so  high  up,  for  the  stairs  are 
hard  on  her.  She  shall  stay  with  me 
while  she  lives  and  I  will  mind  her." 

She  was  as  good  as  her  word.  With 
her  own  hands  and  the  aid  of  every  man 
in  the  tenement  who  happened  to  be 
about,  she  moved  their  belongings  to  the 
new  home,  while  the  mothers  and  children 
cheered  her  on  the  way.  They  live  not 
far  from  there  to-day,  year  by  year  more 
snugly  housed,  for  Kate  is  earning  a 
stenographer's  pay  now.  Her  employers 
in  the  office  raised  her  wages  when  they 


80  NEIGHBORS 

heard,  through  her  friends,  of  Kate's 
plucky  choice;  but  that  is  another  thing 
Kate  Murray  does  not  know.  Since  then 
she  has  set  up  in  business  for  herself. 
Grandma,  as  I  told  you,  is  still  living, 
getting  younger  every  day,  in  her  adora- 
tion of  the  young  woman  who  moves 
about  her,  light-footed  and  light-hearted, 
patting  her  pillow,  smoothing  her  snowy 
hair,  and  showing  affection  for  her  in  a 
thousand  little  ways.  Sometimes  when 
the  young  woman  sings  the  old  Irish  songs 
that  Grandma  herself  taught  the  girl's 
mother  as  a  child,  she  looks  up  with  a 
start,  thinking  it  is  her  Maggie  come 
back.  Then  she  remembers,  and  a  shadow 
flits  across  her  kind  old  face.  If  Kate 
sees  it,  she  steals  up  behind  her,  and, 
putting  two  affectionate  arms  around  her 


'if  KATE  SEKS  IT,  SHE  STEALS  11'  HEHIM)  HEK.  AM),  PlTTINii 
TWO  AFFECTIONATE  ARMS  AROUXO  HER  NECK,  WHISPERS  IN 
HER   EAR,    'I    LOVE   OO,    GRANNIE."" 


KATE'S  CHOICE  81 

neck,  whispers  in  her  ear,  "I  love  oo. 
Grannie,"  and  the  elder  woman  laughs 
and  lives  again  in  the  blessed  present. 
At  such  times  I  wonder  how  much  Kate 
really  does  know.  But  she  keeps  her 
own  counsel. 


THE  MOTHER'S  HEAVEN 

The  door-bell  of  the  Nurses'  Settlement 
rang  loudly  one  rainy  night,  and  a  Polish 
Jewess  demanded  speech  with  Miss  Wald. 
This  was  the  story  she  told :  She  scrubbed 
halls  and  stairs  in  a  nice  tenement  on  the 
East  Side.  In  one  of  the  flats  lived  the 
Schaibles,  a  young  couple  not  long  in  the 
country.  He  was  a  music  teacher.  Believ- 
ing that  money  was  found  in  the  streets  of 
America,  they  furnished  their  flat  finely  on 
the  installment  plan,  expecting  that  he 
would  have  many  pupils,  but  none  came. 
A  baby  did  instead,  and  when  they  were 
three,  what  with  doctor  and  nurse,  their 

money  went  fast.     Now  it  was  all  gone; 

8ie 


THE  MOTHER'S  HEAVEN  83 

the  installment  collector  was  about  to  seize 
their  furniture  for  failure  to  pay,  and  they 
would  lose  all.  The  baby  was  sick  and 
going  to  die.  It  would  have  to  be  buried 
in  *'the  trench,"  for  the  father  and  mother 
were  utterly  friendless  and  penniless. 

She  told  the  story  dispassionately,  as 
one  reciting  an  every-day  event  in  tene- 
ment-house life,  until  she  came  to  the  sick 
baby.     Then  her  soul  was  stirred. 

"I  couldn't  take  no  money  out  of  that 
house,"  she  said.  She  gave  her  day's 
pay  for  scrubbing  to  the  poor  young 
couple  and  came  straight  to  Miss  Wald 
to  ask  her  to  send  a  priest  to  them.  She 
had  little  ones  herself,  and  she  knew  that 
the  mother's  heart  was  grieved  because 
she  couldn't  meet  the  baby  in  her  heaven 
if  it  died  and  was  buried  like  a  dog. 


84  NEIGHBORS 

*"Tain't  mine,"  she  added  with  a  little 
conscious  blush  at  Miss  Wald's  curious 
scrutiny;  *'but  it  wouldn't  be  heaven  to 
her  without  her  child,  would  it?" 

They  are  not  Roman  Catholics  at  the 
Nurses'  Settlement,  either,  as  it  happens, 
but  they  know  the  way  well  to  the  priest's 
door.  Before  the  night  was  an  hour  older 
a  priest  was  in  the  home  of  the  young 
people,  and  with  him  came  a  sister  of 
charity.  Save  the  baby  they  could  not,  but 
keep  it  from  the  Potter's  Field  they  could 
and  did.  It  died,  and  was  buried  with  all  the 
comforting  blessings  of  the  Church,  and  the 
poor  young  parents  were  no  longer  friend- 
less. The  installment  collector,  met  by 
Miss  Wald  in  person,  ceased  to  be  a  terror. 

"And  to  think,"  said  that  lady  indig- 
nantly   from    behind    the    coffee    urn    in 


THE  MOTHER'S  HEAVEN  85 

the  morning,  "to  think  that  they  don't 
have  a  pupil,  not  a  single  one  !" 

The  residenters  seated  at  the  breakfast 
table  laid  down  their  spoons  with  a  com- 
mon accord  and  gazed  imploringly  at  her. 
They  were  used  to  having  their  heads 
shampooed  for  the  cause  by  unskilled 
hands,  to  have  their  dry  goods  spoiled  by 
tyros  at  dressmaking,  and  they  knew  the 
signs. 

"Leading  lady,"  they  chorused,  "oh, 
leading  lady  !  Have  we  got  to  take  music 
lessons  ?" 


WHERE  HE  FOUND  HIS  NEIGHBOR 

"Go  quickly,  please,  to  No.  —  East 
Eleventh  Street,  near  the  river,"  was  the 
burden  of  a  message  received  one  day  in 
the  Charities  Building;  "a  Hungarian 
family  is  in  trouble."  The  little  word 
that  covers  the  widest  range  in  the  lan- 
guage gives  marching  orders  daily  to  many 
busy  feet  thereabouts,  and,  before  the 
October  sun  had  set,  a  visitor  from  the 
Association  for  the  Improvement  of  the 
Condition  of  the  Poor  had  climbed  to  the 
fourth  floor  of  the  tenement  and  found 
the  Josefy  family.  This  was  what  she 
discovered  there :  a  man  in  the  last  stages 
of    consumption,    a    woman    within    two 

86 


WHERE  HE  FOUND  HIS  NEIGHBOR    87 

weeks  of  her  confinement,  five  hungry 
children,  a  landlord  clamoring  for  his  rent. 
The  man  had  long  ceased  to  earn  the 
family  living.  His  wife,  taking  up  that 
burden  with  the  rest,  had  worked  on 
cloaks  for  a  sweater  until  she  also  had  to 
give  up.  In  fact,  the  work  gave  out  just 
as  their  need  was  greatest.  Now,  with 
the  new  baby  coming,  no  preparation  had 
been  made  to  receive  it.  For  those  al- 
ready there,  there  was  no  food  in  the 
house. 

They  had  once  been  well  off.  Josefy 
was  a  tailor,  and  had  employed  nearly  a 
score  of  hands  in  the  busy  season.  He 
paid  forty-four  dollars  a  month  rent  then. 
That  day  the  landlord  had  threatened  to 
dispossess  them  for  one  month's  arrears 
of  seven  dollars,  and  only  because  of  the 


88  NEIGHBORS, 

rain  had  given  them  a  day's  grace.  All 
the  money  saved  up  in  better  days  had 
gone  to  pay  doctor  and  druggist,  without 
making  Josefy  any  better.  His  wife  lis- 
tened dismally  to  the  recital  of  their 
troubles  and  asked  for  work  —  any  light 
work  that  she  could  do. 

The  rent  was  paid,  and  the  baby  came. 
They  were  eight  then,  subsisting,  as  the 
society's  records  show,  in  January  on  the 
earnings  of  Mrs.  Josefy  making  ladies' 
blouse  sleeves  at  twenty-five  cents  a  dozen 
pairs,  in  February  on  the  receipts  of  em- 
broidering initials  on  napkins  at  fifteen 
cents  apiece,  in  March  on  her  labors  in  a 
downtown  house  on  sample  cloaks.  Three 
dollars  a  week  was  her  wage  there.  To 
save  car-fare  she  walked  to  her  work 
and   back,   a   good   two   miles   each   way, 


WHERE  HE  FOUND  HIS  NEIGHBOR    89 

getting  up  at  3  a.m.  to  do  her  home  wash- 
ing and  cleaning  first.  In  bad  weather 
they  were  poorer  by  ten  cents  a  day, 
because  then  she  had  to  ride.  The  neigh- 
bors were  kind ;  the  baker  left  them  bread 
twice  a  week  and  the  butcher  gave  them 
a  little  meat  now  and  then.  The  father's 
hemorrhages  were  more  frequent.  When, 
on  a  slippery  day,  one  of  the  children, 
going  for  milk,  fell  in  the  street  and  spilled 
it,  he  went  without  his  only  food,  as  they 
had  but  eight  cents  in  the  house.  In 
May  came  the  end.  The  tailor  died,  and 
in  the  house  of  mourning  there  was  one 
care  less,  one  less  to  feed  and  clothe. 
The  widow  gathered  her  flock  close  and 
faced  the  future  dry-eyed.  The  luxury 
of  grief  is  not  for  those  at  close  grips  with 
stern  poverty. 


90  NEIGHBORS 

When  word  reached  far-off  Hungary, 
Mrs.  Josefy's  sister  wrote  to  her  to  come 
back;  she  would  send  the  money.  The 
widow's  friends  rejoiced,  but  she  shook 
her  head.  To  face  poverty  as  bitter 
there  ?  This  was  her  children's  country ; 
it  should  be  hers  too.  At  the  Consulate 
they  reasoned  with  her;  the  chance  was 
too  good  to  let  pass.  When  she  persisted, 
they  told  her  to  put  the  children  in  a  home, 
then ;  she  could  never  make  her  way 
with  so  many.  No  doubt  they  considered 
her  an  ungrateful  person  when  she  flatly 
refused  to  do  either.  It  is  not  in  the 
record  that  she  ever  darkened  the  door  of 
the  Consulate  again. 

The  charitable  committee  had  no  better 
success.  They  offered  her  passage  money, 
and  she  refused  it.     "She  is  always  look- 


WHERE  HE  FOUND  HIS  NEIGHBOR    91 

ing  for  work,"  writes  the  visitor  in  the  regis- 
ter, for  once  in  her  life  a  little  resentfully, 
it  would  almost  seem.  When  finally 
tickets  came  at  the  end  of  a  year,  Victor, 
the  oldest  boy,  must  finish  his  schooling 
first.  Exasperated,  the  committee  issues  its 
ultimatum :  she  must  go,  or  put  the  children 
away.  Dry  bread  was  the  family  fare  when 
Mrs.  Josefy  was  confronted  with  it,  but  she 
met  it  as  firmly :  Never  !  she  would  stay 
and  do  the  best  she  could. 

The  record  which  I  have  followed  states 
here  that  the  committee  dropped  her, 
but  stood  by  to  watch  the  struggle,  half 
shamefacedly  one  cannot  help  thinking, 
though  they  had  given  the  best  advice 
they  knew.  Six  months  later  the  widow 
reports  that  "the  children  had  never 
wanted  something  to  eat." 


92  NEIGHBORS 

At  this  time  Victor  is  offered  a  job, 
two  dollars  and  a  half  a  week,  with  a  chance 
of  advancement.  The  mother  goes  out 
house-cleaning.  Together  they  live  on 
bread  and  coffee  to  save  money  for  the 
rent,  but  she  refuses  the  proffered  relief. 
Victor  is  in  the  graduating  class ;  he  must 
finish  his  schooling.  Just  then  her  sewing- 
machine  is  seized  for  debt.  The  com- 
mittee, retreating  in  a  huff  after  a  fresh 
defeat  over  the  emigration  question, 
hastens  to  the  rescue,  glad  of  a  chance, 
and  it  is  restored.  In  sheer  admiration 
at  her  pluck  they  put  it  down  that  '*she 
is  doing  the  best  she  can  to  keep  her  family 
together."  There  is  a  curious  little  entry 
here  that  sizes  up  the  children.  They 
had  sent  them  to  Coney  Island  on  a  vaca- 
tion, but  at  night  they  were  back  home. 


WHERE  HE  FOUND  HIS  NEIGHBOR    93 

I 
"No  one  spoke  to  them  there,"   is  their 

explanation.     They     had     their     mother's 
pride. 

It  happened  in  the  last  month  of  that 
year  that  I  went  out  to  speak  in  a  subur- 
ban New  Jersey  town.  "Neighbors"  was 
my  topic.  I  was  the  guest  of  the  secre- 
tary of  a  Foreign  Mission  Board  that  has 
its  oflSce  in  the  Presbyterian  Building  on 
Fifth  Avenue.  That  night  when  we  sat 
at  dinner  the  talk  ran  on  the  modern 
methods  of  organized  charity.  "Yes," 
said  my  host,  as  his  eyes  rested  on  the 
quiverful  seated  around  the  board,  "it 
is  all  good.  But  best  of  all  would  be  if 
you  could  find  for  me  a  widow,  say,  with 
children  like  my  own,  whom  my  wife  could 
help  in  her  own  way,  and  the  children 
learn  to  take  an  interest  in.     I  have  no 


94  NEIGHBORS 

chance,  as  you  know.  The  office  claims 
all  my  time.  But  they  —  that  would  be 
best  of  all,  for  them  and  for  us." 

And  he  was  right ;  that  would  be  charity 
in  the  real  meaning  of  the  word :  friend- 
ship, the  neighborly  lift  that  gets  one  over 
the  hard  places  in  the  road.  The  other 
half  would  cease  to  be,  on  that  plan,  and 
we  should  all  be  one  great  whole,  pulling 
together,  and  our  democracy  would  be- 
come real.  I  promised  to  find  him  such 
a  widow. 

But  it  proved  a  harder  task  than  I  had 
thought.  None  of  the  widows  I  knew 
had  six  children.  The  charitable  societies 
had  no  family  that  fitted  my  friend's 
case.  But  in  time  I  found  people  who 
knew  about  Mrs.  Josef y.  The  children 
were  right  —  so  many  boys  and  so  many 


WHEN'    WE    HAI)   SET    UP   A    CHRISTMAS    TREE    TOGETHER,    TO   THE 
WILD    DELIGHT    OF    THE    CHILDREN." 


WHERE  HE  FOUND  HIS  NEIGHBOR    95 

girls;  what  they  told  me  of  the  mother 
made  me  want  to  know  more.  I  went 
over  to  East  Eleventh  Street  at  once. 
On  the  way  the  feeling  grew  upon  me  that 
I  had  found  my  friend's  Christmas  pres- 
ent —  I  forgot  to  say  that  it  was  on 
Christmas  Eve  —  and  when  I  saw  them 
and  gathered  something  of  the  fight  that 
splendid  little  woman  had  waged  for  her 
brood  those  eight  long  years,  I  knew  that 
my  search  was  over.  When  we  had  set 
up  a  Christmas  tree  together,  to  the  wild 
delight  of  the  children,  and  I  had  ordered  a 
good  dinner  from  a  neighboring  restaurant 
on  my  friend's  account,  I  hastened  back  to 
tell  him  of  my  good  luck  and  his.  I  knew 
he  was  late  at  the  ofiice  with  his  mail. 

Half-way   across   town   it   came   to   me 
with  a  sense  of  shock  that  I  had  forgotten 


96  NEIGHBORS 

something.  Mrs.  Josefy  had  told  me  that 
she  scrubbed  in  a  public  building,  but 
where  I  had  not  asked.  Perhaps  it  would 
not  have  seemed  important  to  you.  It 
did  to  me,  and  when  I  had  gone  all  the 
way  back  and  she  answered  my  question, 
I  knew  why.  Where  do  you  suppose  she 
scrubbed  ?  In  the  Presbyterian  Building  ! 
Under  his  own  roof  was  the  neighbor  he 
sought.  Almost  they  touched  elbows,  yet 
were  they  farther  apart  than  the  poles. 
Were,  but  no  longer  to  be.  The  very  next 
day  brought  my  friend  and  his  wife  in  from 
their  Jersey  home  to  East  Eleventh  Street. 
Long  years  after  I  found  this  entry  on  the 
register,  under  date  January  20,  1899  : 

"Mrs.  Josefy  states  that  she  never  had 
such  a  happy  Christmas  since  she  came 
to    this    country.     The    children    were    all 


WHERE  HE  FOUND  HIS  NEIGHBOR    97 

so  happy,  and  every  one  had  been  so  kind 
to  them." 

It  was  the  beginning  of  better  days  for 
the  Josefy  family.  Weary  stretches  of 
hard  road  there  were  ahead  yet,  but  they 
were  no  longer  lonesome.  The  ladies* 
committee  that  had  once  so  hotly  blamed 
her  were  her  friends  to  the  last  woman, 
for  she  had  taught  them  with  her  splendid 
pluck  what  it  should  mean  to  be  a  mother 
of  Americans.  They  did  not  offer  to  carry 
her  then  any  more  than  before,  but  they 
went  alongside  with  words  of  neighborly 
cheer  and  saw  her  win  over  every  obstacle. 
Two  years  later  finds  her  still  working  in 
the  Presbyterian  Building  earning  sixteen 
dollars  a  month  and  leaving  her  home  at 
five  in  the  morning.  Her  oldest  boy  is 
making  four  dollars  and  a  half  a  week, 


98  NEIGHBORS 

and  one  of  the  girls  is  learning  dressmaking. 
The  others  are  all  in  school.  One  may  be 
sure  without  asking  that  they  are  not 
laggards  there.  When  the  youngest,  at 
twelve,  is  wanted  by  her  friends  of  the 
mission  board  to  "live  out"  with  them, 
the  mother  refuses  to  let  her  go,  at  the 
risk  of  displeasing  her  benefactors.  The 
child  must  go  to  school  and  learn  a  trade. 
Three  years  more,  and  all  but  the  youngest 
are  employed.  Mrs.  Josefy  has  had  a 
long  illness,  but  she  reports  that  she  can 
help  herself.  They  are  now  paying  four- 
teen dollars  a  month  rent.  On  April  6, 
1904,  the  last  entry  but  one  is  made  on 
the  register :  the  family  is  on  dry  ground 
and  the  "case  is  closed." 

The  last  but  one.     That  one  was  added 
after  a  gap  of  eight  years  when  I  made 


WHERE   HE   FOUND  HIS  NEIGHBOR    99 

inquiries  for  the  Josefys  the  other  day. 
Eight  years  is  a  long  time  in  the  Charities 
Buildings  with  a  heavy  burden  of  human 
woe  and  failure.  Perhaps  for  that  very 
reason  they  had  not  forgotten  Mrs.  Josefy, 
but  they  had  lost  trace  of  her.  She  had 
left  her  old  home  in  Eleventh  Street,  and 
all  that  was  known  was  that  she  was 
somewhere  up  near  Fort  Washington.  I 
asked  that  they  find  her  for  me,  and  a 
week  later  I  read  this  entry  in  the  reg- 
ister, where,  let  us  hope,  the  case  of  the 
Josefys  is  now  closed  for  all  time : 

"The  Josefys  live  now  at  No.  —  West 
One  Hundred  and  Eighty  — st  Street  in  a 
handsome  flat  of  six  sunny  rooms.  The 
oldest  son,  who  is  a  cashier  in  a  broker's 
oflBce  on  a  salary  of  $35  a  week,  is  the  head 
of  the  family.     His  brother   earns   $20   a 


100  NEIGHBORS 

week  in  a  downtown  business.  Two  of 
the  daughters  are  happily  married ;  an- 
other is  a  stenographer.  The  youngest, 
the  baby  of  the  dark  days  in  the  East 
Side  tenement,  was  graduated  from  school 
last  year  and  is  ready  to  join  the  army  of 
workers.  The  mother  begins  to  feel  her 
years,  but  is  happy  with  her  children." 

Some  Christmas  Eve  I  will  go  up  and 
see  them  and  take  my  friend  from  the 
Presbyterian  Building  along. 

This  is  the  story  of  a  poor  woman, 
daughter  of  a  proud  and  chivalrous  people, 
whose  sons  have  helped  make  great  for- 
tunes grow  in  our  land  and  have  received 
scant  pay  and  scantier  justice  in  return, 
and  of  whom  it  is  the  custom  of  some 
Americans  to  speak  with  contempt  as 
"Huns." 


WHAT  THE  SNOWFLAKE  TOLD 

The  first  snowflake  was  wafted  in  upon 
the  north  wind  to-day.  I  stood  in  my 
study  door  and  watched  it  fall  and  dis- 
appear; but  I  knew  that  many  would 
come  after  and  hide  my  garden  from  sight 
ere  long.  What  will  the  winter  bring  us  ? 
When  they  wake  once  more,  the  flowers 
that  now  sleep  snugly  under  their  blanket 
of  dead  leaves,  what  shall  we  have  to  tell  ? 

The  postman  has  just  brought  me  a 
letter,  and  with  it  lying  open  before  me, 
my  thoughts  wandered  back  to  "the  hard 
winter"  of  a  half -score  seasons  ago  which 
none  of  us  has  forgotten,  when  women  and 
children  starved  in  cold  garrets  while  men 

101 


102  NEIGHBORS 

roamed  gaunt  and  hollow-eyed  vainly  seek- 
ing work.  I  saw  the  poor  tenement  in 
Rivington  Street  where  a  cobbler  and  his 
boy  were  fighting  starvation  all  alone 
save  for  an  occasional  visit  from  one  of 
Miss  Wald's  nurses  who  kept  a  watchful 
eye  on  them  as  on  so  many  another  totter- 
ing near  the  edge  in  that  perilous  time, 
ready  with  the  lift  that  brought  back  hope 
when  all  things  seemed  at  an  end.  One 
day  she  found  a  stranger  in  the  flat,  a 
man  with  close-cropped  hair  and  a  hard 
look  that  told  their  own  story.  The 
cobbler  eyed  her  uneasily,  and,  when  she 
went,  followed  her  out  and  made  excuses. 
Yes  !  he  was  just  out  of  prison  and  had 
come  to  him  for  shelter.  He  used  to 
know  him  in  other  days,  and  Jim  was 
not  — 


WHAT  THE  SNOWFLAKE  TOLD      103 

She  interrupted  him  and  shook  her  head. 
Was  it  good  for  the  boy  to  have  that  kind 
of  a  man  in  the  house  ? 

The  cobbler  looked  at  her  thought- 
fully and  touched  her  arm  gently. 

"This,"  he  said,  "ain't  no  winter  to 
let  a  feller  from  Sing  Sing  be  on  the  street." 

The  letter  the  postman  brought  made 
me  see  all  this  and  more  in  the  snowflake 
that  fell  and  melted  in  my  garden.  It 
came  from  a  friend  in  the  far  West,  a 
gentle,  high-bred  lady,  and  told  me  this 
story :  Her  sister,  who  devotes  her  life 
to  helping  the  neighbor,  had  just  been  on 
a  visit  to  her  home.  One  day  my  friend 
noticed  her  wearing  an  odd  knitted  shawl, 
and  spoke  of  it. 

*'Yes,"  said  she,  "that  is  the  shawl 
the  cook  gave  me." 


104  NEIGHBORS 

"The  cook?"  with  lifted  eyebrows,  I 
suppose.     And  then  she  heard  how. 

One  day,  going  through  the  kitchen  of 
the  institution  where  she  teaches,  she 
had  seen  the  cook  in  tears  and  inquired 
the  cause.  The  poor  woman  sobbed  out 
that  her  daughter  had  come  home  to  die. 
The  doctors  had  said  that  she  might  live 
perhaps  ten  days,  no  longer,  and  early 
and  late  she  cried  for  her  mother  to  be  with 
her.  But  she  had  vainly  tried  every  way 
to  get  a  cook  to  take  her  place  —  there  was 
none,  and  her  child  was  dying  in  the  hospital. 

"And  I  told  her  to  go  to  her  right  away, 
I  would  see  to  that;  that  was  all,"  con- 
cluded my  friend's  sister;  "and  she  gave 
me  this  shawl  when  she  came  back,  and 
I  took  it,  of  course.  She  had  worked  it 
for  the  daughter  that  died." 


WHAT  THE   SNOWFLAKE  TOLD      105 

But  it  was  not  all.  For  during  ten  days 
of  sweltering  July  heat  that  gentle,  deli- 
cate woman  herself  superintended  the 
kitchen,  did  the  cooking,  and  took  the 
place  of  the  mother  who  was  soothing 
her  dying  child's  brow,  and  no  one  knew 
it.  Not  here,  that  is.  No  doubt  it  is 
known,  with  a  hundred  such  daily  hap- 
penings that  make  the  real  story  of  human 
life,  where  that  record  is  kept  and  cher- 
ished. 

And  clear  across  the  continent  it  comes 
to  solve  a  riddle  that  had  puzzled  me. 
Recently  I  had  long  arguments  with  a 
friend  about  religion  and  dogmas  that 
didn't  help  either  of  us.  At  the  end  of 
three  weeks  we  were  farther  apart  than 
when  we  began,  and  the  arguments  had 
grown  into  controversy  that  made  us  both 


106  NEIGHBORS 

unhappy.  We  had  to  have  a  regular  treaty 
of  peace  to  get  over  it.  I  know  why  now. 
The  snowflake  and  my  friend's  letter 
told  me.  Those  two,  the  cobbler  and  the 
woman,  were  real  Christians.  They  had 
the  secret.  They  knew  the  neighbor,  if 
neither  had  ever  heard  of  dogma  or  creed. 
Our  arguments  were  worse  than  wasted, 
though  we  both  meant  well,  for  we  were 
nearer  neighbors  when  we  began  than 
when  we  left  off. 

I  am  not  learned  in  such  things.  Per- 
haps I  am  wrong.  No  doubt  dogmas  are 
useful  —  to  wrap  things  in  —  but  even 
then  I  would  not  tuck  in  the  ends,  lest 
we  hide  the  neighbor  so  that  we  cannot 
see  him.  After  all,  it  is  what  is  in  the 
package  that  counts.  To  me  it  is  the 
evidence  of  such  as  these  that  God  lives 


WHAT  THE  SNOWFLAKE  TOLD      107 

in  human  hearts  —  that  we  are  molded 
in  his  image  despite  flaws  and  failures  in 
the  casting  —  that  keeps  alive  the  belief 
that  we  shall  wake  with  the  flowers  to 
a  fairer  spring.  Is  it  not  so  with  all  of 
us? 


THE   CITY'S  HEART 

"Bosh  !"  said  my  friend,  jabbing  im- 
patiently with  his  stick  at  a  gaunt  cat  in 
the  gutter,  "  all  bosh  !  A  city  has  no  heart. 
It's  incorporated  selfishness ;  has  to  be. 
Slopping  over  is  not  business.  City  is  all 
business.  A  poet's  dream,  my  good  fellow ; 
pretty  but  moonshine  !" 

We  turned  the  corner  of  the  tenement 
street  as  he  spoke.  The  placid  river  was 
before  us,  with  the  moonlight  upon  it. 
Far  as  the  eye  reached,  up  and  down  the 
stream,  the  shores  lay  outlined  by  rows 
of  electric  lamps,  like  strings  of  shining 
pearls ;  red  lights  and  green  fights  moved 
upon  the  water.     From  a  roofed-over  pier 

108 


THE   CITY'S  HEART  109 

near  by  came  the  joyous  shouts  of  troops 
of  children,  and  the  rhythmic  tramp  of 
many  feet  to  the  strains  of  "Could  you  be 
true  to  eyes  of  blue  if  you  looked  into 
eyes  of  brown?"  A  "play-pier"  in  even- 
ing session. 

I  looked  at  my  friend.  He  stood  gaz- 
ing out  over  the  river,  hat  in  hand,  the 
gentle  sea-breeze  caressing  the  lock  at 
his  temple  that  is  turning  gray.  Some- 
thing he  started  to  say  had  died  on  his 
lips.  He  was  listening  to  the  laughter  of 
the  children.  What  thoughts  of  days  long 
gone,  before  the  oflBce  and  the  market 
reports  shut  youth  and  sunshine  out  of 
his  life,  came  to  soften  the  hard  lines  in 
his  face,  I  do  not  know.  As  I  watched, 
the  music  on  the  pier  died  away  in  a  great 
hush.     The  river  with  its  lights  was  gone ; 


110  NEIGHBORS 

my  friend  was  gone.  The  years  were 
gone  with  their  burden.  The  world  was 
young  once  more. 

I  was  in  a  court-room  full  of  men  with 
pale,  stern  faces.  I  saw  a  child  brought 
in,  carried  in  a  horse-blanket,  at  the  sight 
of  which  men  wept  aloud.  I  saw  it  laid 
at  the  feet  of  the  judge,  who  turned  his 
face  away,  and  in  the  stillness  of  that 
court-room  I  heard  a  voice  raised  claim- 
ing for  the  human  child  the  protection 
men  had  denied  it,  in  the  name  of  the  home- 
less cur  of  the  street.  And  I  heard  the 
story  of  little  Mary  Ellen  told  again,  that 
stirred  the  souls  of  a  city  and  roused  the 
conscience  of  a  world  that  had  forgotten. 
The  sweet-faced  missionary  who  found 
Mary  Ellen  was  there,  wife  of  a  newspaper 
man  —  happy  augury ;    where  the  gospel 


THE  CITY'S  HEART  111 

of  faith  and  the  gospel  of  facts  join  hands 
the  world  moves.  She  told  how  the  poor 
consumptive  in  the  dark  slum  tenement, 
at  whose  bedside  she  daily  read  the  Bible, 
could  not  die  in  peace  while  *'the  child 
they  called  Mary  Ellen"  was  beaten  and 
tortured  in  the  next,  flat;  and  how  on 
weary  feet  she  went  from  door  to  door  of 
the  powerful,  vainly  begging  mercy  for 
it  and  peace  for  her  dying  friend.  The 
police  told  her  to  furnish  evidence,  prove 
crime,  or  they  could  not  move;  the  socie- 
ties said:  "bring  the  child  to  us  legally, 
and  we  will  see;  till  then  we  can  do  noth- 
ing"; the  charitable  said,  "it  is  danger- 
ous to  interfere  between  parent  and  child; 
better  let  it  alone."  And  the  judges  said 
that  it  was  even  so;  it  was  for  them  to 
see  that  men  walked  in  the  way  laid  down, 


112  NEIGHBORS 

not  to  find  it  —  until  her  woman's  heart 
rebelled  in  anger  against  it  all,  and  she 
sought  the  great  friend  of  the  dumb  brute, 
who  made  a  way. 

"The  child  is  an  animal,"  he  said.  "If 
there  is  no  justice  for  it  as  a  human  being, 
it  shall  at  least  have  the  rights  of  the 
cur  in  the  street.     It  shall  not  be  abused.'* 

And  as  I  looked  I  knew  that  I  was  where 
the  first  charter  of  the  Children's  rights 
was  written  under  warrant  of  that  made 
for  the  dog;  for  from  that  dingy  court- 
room, whence  a  wicked  woman  went  to 
jail,  thirty  years  ago  came  forth  the 
Children's  Society,  with  all  it  has  meant 
to  the  world's  life.  It  is  quickening  its 
pulse  to  this  day  in  lands  and  among 
peoples  who  never  spoke  the  name  of  my 
city    and    Mary    Ellen's.     For    her  —  her 


THE  CITY'S  HEART  113 

life  has  run  since  like  an  even  summer 
stream  between  flowery  shores.  When  last 
I  had  news  of  her,  she  was  the  happy  wife 
of  a  prosperous  farmer  up-State. 

The  lights  on  the  river  shone  out  once 
more.  From  the  pier  came  a  chorus  of 
children's  voices  singing  *' Sunday  After- 
noon" as  only  East  Side  children  can. 
My  friend  was  listening  intently.  Aye, 
well  did  I  remember  the  wail  that  came 
to  the  Police  Board,  in  the  days  that  are 
gone,  from  a  pastor  over  there.  "The 
children  disturb  our  worship,"  he  wrote ; 
*'they  gather  in  the  street  at  my  church 
and  sing  and  play  while  we  would  pray"; 
and  the  bitter  retort  of  the  police  captain 
of  the  precinct:  "They  have  no  other 
place  to  play;  better  pray  for  sense  to 
help  them  get  one."     I  saw  him  the  other 


114  NEIGHBORS 

day  —  the  preacher  —  singing  to  the 
children  in  the  tenement  street  and  giving 
them  flowers ;  and  I  knew  that  the  day  of 
sense  and  of  charity  had  swept  him  with 
it. 

The  present  is  swallowed  up  again,  and 
there  rises  before  me  the  wraith  of  a  vil- 
lage church  in  the  far-off  mountains  of 
Pennsylvania.  It  is  Sunday  morning  at 
midsummer.  In  the  pulpit  a  young  clergy- 
man is  preaching  from  the  text:  "Inas- 
much as  ye  did  it  unto  one  of  these  my 
brethren,  even  the  least,  ye  did  it  unto 
me."  The  sun  peeps  through  the  win- 
dows, where  climbing  roses  nod.  In  the 
tall  maples  a  dove  is  cooing;  the  drowsy 
hum  of  the  honey-bee  is  on  the  air.  But 
he  recks  not  of  these,  nor  of  the  peaceful 
day.     His  soul  has  seen   a   vision   of   hot 


THE  CITY'S  HEART  115 

and  stony  streets,  of  squalid  homes,  of 
hard-visaged,  unlovely  childhood,  of  man- 
kind made  in  His  image  twisted  by  want 
and  ignorance  into  monstrous  deformity : 
and  the  message  he  speaks  goes  straight 
to  the  heart  of  the  plain  farmers  on  the 
benches;  His  brethren  these,  and  steeped 
in  the  slum !  They  gather  round  him 
after  the  service,  their  hearts  burning 
within  them. 

I  see  him  speeding  the  next  day  toward 
the  great  city,  a  messenger  of  love  and 
pity  and  help.  I  see  him  return  before 
the  week's  end,  nine  starved  urchins  cling- 
ing to  his  hands  and  the  skirts  of  his  coat, 
the  first  Fresh  Air  party  that  went  out  of 
New  York  twoscore  years  ago.  I  see 
the  big-hearted  farmers  take  them  into 
their   homes   and   hearts.     I   see   the   sun 


116  NEIGHBORS 

and  the  summer  wind  put  back  color  in 
the  wan  cheek,  and  life  in  the  shrunken 
and  starved  frame.  I  hear  the  message 
of  one  of  the  little  ones  to  her  chums  left 
behind  in  the  tenement:  "I  can  have 
two  pieces  of  pie  to  eat,  and  nobody 
says  nothing  if  I  take  three  pieces  of  cake  " ; 
and  I  know  what  it  means  to  them. 
Laugh  ?  Yes  !  laugh  and  be  glad.  The 
world  has  sorrow  enough.  Let  in  the 
sunshine  where  you  can,  and  know  that 
it  means  life  to  these,  life  now  and  a  glimpse 
of  the  hereafter.  I  can  hear  it  yet,  the 
sigh  of  the  tired  mother  under  the  trees 
on  Twin  Island,  our  Henry-street  children's 
summer  home:  "If  heaven  is  like  this, 
I  don't  care  how  soon  I  go." 

For  the  sermon  had  wings ;  and  whither- 
soever it  went  blessings  sprang  in  its  track. 


THE  CITY'S  HEART  117 

Love  and  justice  grew;  men  read  the 
brotherhood  into  the  sunlight  and  the 
fields  and  the  woods,  and  the  brotherhood 
became  real.  I  see  the  minister,  no  longer 
so  young,  sitting  in  his  oflSce  in  the  "Trib- 
une" building,  still  planning  Fresh  Air 
holidays  for  the  children  of  the  hot,  stony 
city.  But  he  seeks  them  himself  no  more. 
A  thousand  churches,  charities,  kinder- 
gartens, settlements,  a  thousand  preachers 
and  doers  of  the  brotherhood,  gather  them 
in.  A  thousand  trains  of  many  crowded 
cars  carry  them  to  the  homes  that  are 
waiting  for  them  wherever  men  and  women 
with  warm  hearts  live.  The  message  has 
traveled  to  the  farthest  shores,  and  no- 
where in  the  Christian  world  is  there  a 
place  where  it  has  not  been  heard  and 
heeded.     Wherever  it  has,  there  you  have 


118  NEIGHBORS 

seen  the  heart  of  man  laid  bare;    and  the 
sight  is  good. 

"'Way  —  down  —  yonder  —  in  —  the 
—  corn-field,"  brayed  the  band,  and  the 
shrill  chorus  took  up  the  words.  At  last 
they  meant  something  to  them.  It  was 
worth  living  in  the  day  that  taught  that 
lesson  to  the  children  of  the  tenements. 
Other  visions,  new  scenes,  came  trooping 
by  on  the  refrain :  the  farm-homes  far 
and  near  where  they  found,  as  the  years 
passed  and  the  new  love  grew  and  warmed 
the  hearts,  that  they  had  entertained 
angels  unawares ;  the  host  of  boys  and 
girls,  greater  than  would  people  a  city, 
that  have  gone  out  to  take  with  the  old 
folks  the  place  of  the  lads  who  would  not 
stay  on  the  land,  and  have  grown  up  sturdy 
men  and  women,  good  citizens,  governors 


THE  CITY'S  HEART  119 

of  States  some  of  them,  cheating  the  slum 
of  its  due;  the  floating  hospitals  that 
carry  their  cargoes  of  white  and  helpless 
little  sufferers  down  the  bay  in  the  hot 
summer  days,  and  bring  them  back  at 
night  sitting  bolt  upright  at  the  supper- 
table  and  hammering  it  with  their  spoons, 
shouting  for  more;  the  new  day  that 
shines  through  the  windows  of  our  school- 
houses,  dispelling  the  nightmare  of  dry- 
as-dust  pedagoguery,  and  plants  brass- 
bands  upon  the  roof  of  the  school,  where 
the  children  dance  and  are  happy  under 
the  stars ;  that  builds  play-piers  and  neigh- 
borhood parks  in  which  never  a  sign  *'Keep 
off  the  Grass"  shall  stand  to  their  un- 
doing; that  grows  school-gardens  in  the 
steps  of  the  kindergarten,  makes  truck- 
farmers   on  city  lots   of  the  toughs  they 


120  NEIGHBORS 

would  have  bred,  lying  waste ;  that  strikes 
the  fetters  of  slavery  from  childhood  in 
home  and  workshop,  and  breaks  the  way 
for  a  better  to-morrow.  Happy  vision  of 
a  happy  day  that  came  in  with  the  tears 
of  little  Mary  Ellen.  Truly  they  were 
not  shed  in  vain. 

There  was  a  pause  in  the  play  on  the 
pier.  Then  the  strains  of  "America" 
floated  down  to  us  where  we  stood. 

"Long  may  our  land  be  bright 
With  Freedom's  holy  light," 

came  loud  and  clear  in  the  childish  voices. 
They  knew  it  by  heart,  and  no  wonder. 
To  their  fathers,  freedom  was  but  an 
empty  name,  a  mockery.  My  friend  stood 
bareheaded  till  the  last  line  was  sung : 

"Great  God,  our  King!" 


THE   CITY'S  HEART  121 

then  he  put  on  his  hat  and  nodded  to  me 
to  come.  We  walked  away  in  silence. 
To  him,  too,  there  had  come  in  that  hour 
the  vision  of  the  heart  of  the  great  city; 
and  before  it  he  was  dumb. 


CHIPS  FROM  THE  MAELSTROM 

It  is  a  good  many  years  since  I  ran 
across  the  Murphy  family  while  hunt- 
ing up  a  murder,  in  the  old  Mulberry 
Street  days.  That  was  not  their  name, 
but  no  matter;  it  was  one  just  as  good. 
Their  home  was  in  Poverty  Gap,  and  I 
have  seldom  seen  a  worse.  The  man 
was  a  wife-beater  when  drunk,  which  he 
was  whenever  he  had  '*the  price."  Hard 
work  and  hard  knocks  had  made  a  wreck 
of  his  wife.  The  five  children,  two  of  them 
girls,  were  growing  up  as  they  could, 
which  was  not  as  they  should,  but  accord- 
ing to  the  way  of  Poverty  Gap :  in  the 
gutter. 

122 


CHIPS  FROM  THE  MAELSTROM     123 

We  took  them  and  moved  them  across 
town  from  the  West  Side  to  be  nearer  us, 
for  it  was  a  case  where  to  be  neighbor  one 
had  to  stand  close.  As  another  step,  I 
had  the  man  taken  up  and  sent  to  the 
Island.  He  came  home  the  next  week, 
and  before  the  sun  set  on  another  day 
had  run  his  family  to  earth.  We  found 
one  of  the  boys  bringing  beer  in  a  can 
and  Mr.  Murphy  having  a  good  time  on 
the  money  we  had  laid  away  against  the 
landlord's  call.  Mrs.  Murphy  was  nurs- 
ing a  black  eye  at  the  sink.  She  had 
done  her  best,  but  she  was  fighting  against 
fate. 

So  it  seemed ;  for  as  the  years  went  by, 
though  he  sometimes  stayed  out  his  month 
on  the  Island  —  more  often,  especially  if 
near  election  time,  he  was  back  the  next 


124  NEIGHBORS 

or  even  the  same  day  —  and  though  we 
moved  the  family  into  every  unlikely 
neighborhood  we  could  think  of,  always 
he  found  them  out  and  celebrated  his 
return  home  by  beating  his  wife  and  chas- 
ing the  children  out  to  buy  beer,  the  girls, 
as  they  grew  up,  to  earn  in  the  street  the 
money  for  his  debauches.  I  had  talked 
the  matter  over  with  the  Chief  of  Police, 
who  was  interested  on  the  human  side, 
and  we  had  agreed  that  there  was  no  other 
way  than  to  eliminate  Mr.  Murphy.  All 
benevolent  schemes  of  reforming  him  were 
preposterous.  So,  between  us,  we  sent 
him  to  jail  nineteen  times.  He  did  not 
always  get  there.  Once  he  was  back  be- 
fore he  could  have  reached  the  Island 
ferry;  we  never  knew  how.  Another 
time,    when    the    doorman    at    the   police 


CHIPS  FROM  THE   MAELSTROM     125 

station  was  locking  him  up,  he  managed 
to  get  on  the  free  side  of  the  door,  and, 
drunk  as  he  was,  slammed  it  on  the  police- 
man and  locked  him  in.  Then  he  sat 
down  outside,  lighted  his  pipe  and  cracked 
jokes  at  the  helpless  anger  of  his  prisoner. 
Murphy  was  a  humorist  in  his  way.  Had 
he  also  been  a  poet  he  might  have  secured 
his  discharge  as  did  his  chum  on  the  Island 
who  delivered  himself  thus  in  his  own 
defense  before  the  police  judge  : 

"Leaves  have  their  time  to  fall. 

And  so  likewise  have  I. 
The  reason,  too,  is  the  same. 

It  comes  of  getting  dry. 
The  difference  'twixt  leaves  and  me  — 

I  fall  more  harder  and  more  frequently." 

But  Murphy  was  no  poet,  and  his  sense 
of  humor  was  of  a  kind  too  fraught  with 
peril    to    life    and    limb.     When    he    was 


126  NEIGHBORS 

arraigned  the  nineteenth  time,  the  judge 
in  the  Essex  Market  Court  lost  patience 
when  I  tried  to  persuade  him  to  break  the 
Island  routine  and  hold  the  man  for  the 
Special  Sessions,  and  ordered  me  sternly 
to  "Stand  down,  sir  !  This  court  is  not 
to  be  dictated  to  by  anybody."  I  had  to 
remind  his  Honor  that  unless  he  could  be 
persuaded  to  deal  rationally  with  Mr. 
Murphy  the  court  might  yet  come  to  be 
charged  before  the  Grand  Jury  with  being 
accessory  to  wife  murder,  for  assuredly  it 
was  coming  to  that.  It  helped,  and  Mur- 
phy's case  was  considered  in  Sessions, 
where  a  sentence  of  two  years  and  a  half 
was  imposed  upon  him.  While  serving 
it  he  died. 

The  children  had  meanwhile  grown  into 
young  men  and  women.     The  first  sum- 


CHIPS  FROM  THE  MAELSTROM     127 

mer,  when  we  sent  the  two  girls  to  a  cler- 
gyman's family  in  the  country,  they  stole 
some  rings  and  came  near  wrecking  all 
our  plans.  But  those  good  people  had 
sense,  and  saw  that  the  children  stole  as 
a  magpie  steals  —  the  gold  looked  good 
to  them.  They  kept  them,  and  they  have 
since  grown  into  good  women.  To  be 
sure,  it  was  like  a  job  of  original  creation. 
They  had  to  be  built,  morally  and  intel- 
lectually, from  the  ground  up.  But  in 
the  end  we  beat  Poverty  Gap.  The  boys  ? 
That  was  a  harder  fight,  for  the  gutter 
had  its  grip  on  them.  But  we  pulled 
them  out.  At  all  events,  they  did  better 
than  their  father.  When  they  were 
fifteen  they  wore  neckties,  which  in  itself 
was  a  challenge  to  the  traditions  of  the 
Gap.     I  don't  think  I  ever  saw  Mr.  Mur- 


128  NEIGHBORS 

phy  with  one,  or  a  collar  either.  They 
will  never  be  college  professors,  but  they 
promised  fair  to  be  honest  workingmen, 
which  was  much. 

What  to  do  with  the  mother  was  a  sore 
puzzle  for  a  while.  She  could  not  hold  a 
flat-iron  in  her  hand ;  didn't  know  which 
end  came  first.  She  could  scrub,  and  we 
began  at  that.  With  infinite  patience, 
she  was  taught  washing  and  ironing,  and 
between  visits  from  her  rascal  husband 
began  to  make  out  well.  For  she  was 
industrious,  and,  with  hope  reviving,  life 
took  on  some  dignity,  inconceivable  in 
her  old  setting.  In  spite  of  all  his  cruelty 
she  never  wholly  cast  off  her  husband. 
He  was  still  to  her  Mr.  Murphy,  the  head 
of  the  house,  if  by  chance  he  were  to  be 
caught  out  sober;    but  the  chance  never 


CHIPS  FROM  THE  MAELSTROM     129 

befell.  It  was  right  that  he  should  be 
locked  up,  but  outside  of  these  official 
relations  of  his,  as  it  were,  with  society, 
she  had  no  criticism  to  make  upon  him. 
Only  once,  when  he  dropped  a  note  show- 
ing that  he  had  been  carrying  on  a  flirta- 
tion with  a  "scrub"  on  the  Island,  did 
she  exhibit  any  resentment.  Mrs.  Murphy 
was  jealous ;   that  is,  she  was  human. 

Through  all  the  years  of  his  abuse,  with 
the  instinct  of  her  race,  she  had  managed 
to  keep  up  an  insurance  on  his  life  that 
would  give  him  a  decent  burial.  And 
when  he  lay  dead  at  last  she  spent  it  all  — 
more  than  a  hundred  and  fifty  dollars  — 
on  a  wake  over  the  fellow,  all  except  a 
small  sum  which  she  reserved  for  her  own 
adornment  in  his  honor.  She  came  over 
to    the    Settlement    to    consult    our    head 


130  NEIGHBORS 

worker  as  to  the  proprieties  of  the  thing: 
should  she  wear  mourning  earrings  in  his 
memory  ? 

Such  is  the  plain  record  of  the  Murphy 
family,  one  of  the  oldest  on  our  books  in 
Henry  Street.  Over  against  it  let  me  set 
one  of  much  more  recent  date,  and  let 
them  tell  their  own  story. 

Our  gardener,  when  he  came  to  dig  up 
from  their  winter  bed  by  the  back  fence 
the  privet  shrubs  that  grow  on  our  roof 
garden  in  summer,  reported  that  one  was 
missing.  It  was  not  a  great  loss,  and  we 
thought  no  more  about  it,  till  one  day  one 
of  our  kindergarten  workers  came  tip- 
toeing in  and  beckoned  us  out  on  the  roof. 
Way  down  in  the  depth  of  the  tenement- 
house  yard  back  of  us,  where  the  ice  lay 
in   a   grimy   crust   long   after   the   spring 


CHIPS  FROM  THE  MAELSTROM     131 

flowers  had  begun  to  peep  out  in  our 
garden  above,  grew  our  missing  shrub. 
A  piece  of  ground,  yard-wide,  had  been 
cleared  of  rubbish  and  dug  over.  In  the 
middle  of  the  plot  stood  the  privet  shrub, 
trimmed  to  make  it  impersonate  a  young 
tree.  A  fence  had  been  built  about  it 
with  lath,  and  the  whole  thing  had  quite 
a  festive  look)  A  little  lad  was  watering 
and  tending  the  "garden."  He  looked 
up  and  saw  us  and  nodded  with  perfect 
frankness.  He  was  Italian,  by  the  looks 
of  him) 

One  of  our  workers  went  around  in 
Madison  Street  to  invite  him  to  the  Settle- 
ment, where  we  would  give  him  all  the 
flowers  he  wanted. 

"But  come  by  the  front  door,  not  over 
the    back    fence,"    was    the    message    she 


132  NEIGHBORS 

bore,  and  he  said  he  would.  He  made 
no  bones  of  having  raided  our  yard.  He 
wanted  the  "tree"  and  took  it.  But  he 
didn't  come.  It  was  a  long  way  round ; 
his  was  more  direct.  This  spring  the 
same  worker  caught  him  climbing  the 
back  fence  once  more,  and  this  time  try- 
ing to  drag  back  with  him  a  whole  win- 
dow-box. She  was  just  in  time  to  pull  it 
back  on  our  side.  He  let  go  his  grip  with- 
out resentment.  It  was  the  fate  of  war; 
that  time  we  won.  We  renewed  our 
invitation  after  that,  and,  when  he  didn't 
respond,  sent  him  four  blossoming  gera- 
niums with  the  friendly  regards  of  a  neigh- 
bor who  bore  no  grudge.  For  in  our 
social  creed  the  longing  for  a  flower  in  the 
child-heart  covers  a  maze  of  mischief ;  and 
a  maze  it  is  always  with  the  boys.     No 


CHIPS  FROM  THE  MAELSTROM     133 

wonder  we  feel  that  way.     Our  work,  all 
of  it,   sprang  from  that  longing  and  was 
built  upon  it.     But  that  is  another  story. 
The  other  day  I  looked  down  and  saw 
our   flowers   blooming   there,    but   with   a 
discouraged  look  I  could  make  out  even 
from    that    height.     Still    no    news    from 
their  owner.     A  little  girl  with  blue  rib- 
bons in  her  hair  was   watering  them.     I 
went  around  and  struck  up  an  acquaintance 
with  her.     Mike  was  in  the  country,  she 
said,  on  Long  Island,  where  his  sister  was 
married.     She,    too,    was    his    sister.     Her 
name  was  Rose,  and  a  sweet  little  rose  she 
did  look  like  in  all  the  litter  of  that  tene- 
ment  yard.     It    was    for    her    Mike    had 
made  the  garden  and  had  built  the  summer- 
house  which  she  and  her  friends  furnished. 
She  took  me  to  it,  in  the  corner  of  the 


134  NEIGHBORS 

garden.  You  could  just  put  your  head 
in;  but  it  was  worth  while.  The  walls, 
made  of  old  boxes  and  boards,  had  been 
papered  with  colored  supplements.  The 
*'Last  Supper"  was  there,  and  some  bird 
pictures,  a  snipe  and  a  wood-duck  with  a 
wholesome  suggestion  of  outdoors;  on  a 
nicely  papered  shelf  some  shining  bits  of 
broken  crockery  to  finish  things  off.  A 
doll's  bed  and  chair  furnished  one-half 
of  the  "house,"  a  wobbly  parlor  chair  the 
other  half.  The  initials  of  the  four  girl 
friends  were  written  in  blue  chalk  over 
the  door. 

The  "garden"  was  one  step  across,  two 
the  long  way.  I  saw  at  a  glance  why  the 
geraniums  drooped,  with  leaves  turning  yel- 
low. She  had  taken  them  out  of  the  pots 
and  set  them  right  on  top  of  the  ground. 


CHIPS  FROM  THE  MAELSTROM     135 

"But  that  isn't  the  way,"  I  said,  and 
rolled  up  my  sleeves  to  show  her  how  to 
plant  a  flower.  I  shall  not  soon  get  the 
smell  of  that  sour  soil  out  of  my  nostrils 
and  my  memory.  It  welled  up  with  a 
thousand  foul  imaginings  of  the  gutter 
the  minute  I  dug  into  it  with  the  lath  she 
gave  me  for  a  spade.  Inwardly  I  re- 
solved that  before  summer  came  again 
there  should  be  a  barrel  of  the  sweet  whole- 
some earth  from  my  own  Long  Island 
garden  in  that  back  yard,  in  which  a  rose- 
bush might  live.     But  the  sun  ? 

"Does  it  ever  come  here.'^"  I  asked, 
doubtfully  glancing  up  at  the  frowning 
walls  that  hedged  us  in. 

"Every  evening  it  comes  for  a  little 
while,"  she  said  cheerfully.  It  must  be  a 
little    while    indeed,    in    that    den.     She 


136  NEIGHBORS 

showed  me  a  straggling  green  thing  with 
no  leaves.  *'That  is  a  potato,"  she  said, 
*'and  this  is  a  bean.  That's  the  way 
they  grow."  The  bean  was  trying  feebly 
to  climb  a  string  to  the  waste-pipe  that 
crossed  the  "garden"  and  burrowed  in  it. 
Between  the  shell-paved  walk  and  the  wall 
was  a  border  two  hands  wide  where  there 
was  nothing. 

"There  used  to  be  grass  there,"  she 
said,  "but  the  cats  ate  it."  On  the  wall 
above  it  was  chalked  the  inevitable  "Keep 
off  the  Grass."  They  had  done  their 
best. 

Three  or  four  plants  with  no  tradi- 
tional prejudices  as  to  soil  grew  in  one 
corner.  "Mike  found  the  seed  of  them," 
she  said  simply.  I  glanced  at  the  back 
fence  and  guessed  where. 


CHIPS  FROM  THE   MAELSTROM     137 

She  was  carrying  water  from  the 
hydrant  when  I  went  out.  "They're 
good  people,"  said  the  old  housekeeper, 
who  had  come  out  to  see  what  the  strange 
man  was  there  for.  On  the  stoop  sat  an 
old  grandfather  with  a  child  in  his  lap. 

"It  is  the  way  of  'em,"  he  said.  "I 
asked  this  one,"  patting  the  child  affec- 
tionately, "what  she  wanted  for  her  birth- 
day. 'Gran 'pa,'  she  said,  *I  want  a  flower.' 
Now  did  ye  ever  hear  such  a  dern  little 
fool.'*"  and  he  smoothed  her  tangled  head. 
But  I  saw  that  he  understood. 

Chips  from  the  maelstrom  that  swirls 
ever  in  our  great  city.  We  stand  on  the 
shore  and  pull  in  such  wrecks  as  we  may. 
I  set  them  down  here  without  comment, 
without  theory.  For  it  is  not  theory  that 
in   the   last   going   over   we   are  brothers, 


138  NEIGHBORS 

being  children  of  one  Father.  Hence  our 
real  heredity  is  this,  that  we  are  children 
of  God.  Hence,  also,  our  fight  upon  the 
environment  that  would  smother  instincts 
proclaiming  our  birthright  is  the  great 
human  issue,  the  real  fight  for  freedom, 
in  all  days. 

And  Murphy,  says  my  carping  friend, 
where  does  he  come  in  ?  He  does  not 
come  in;  unless  it  be  that  the  love  and 
loyalty  of  his  wife  which  not  all  his  cruelty 
could  destroy,  and  the  inhumanity  of 
Poverty  Gap,  plead  for  him  that  another 
chance  may  be  given  the  man  in  him. 
Who  knows  ? 


HEARTSEASE 

In  a  mean  street,  over  on  the  West  Side, 
I  came  across  a  doorway  that  bore  upon 
its  plate  the  word  "Heartsease."  The 
house  was  as  mean  as  the  street.  It  was 
flanked  on  one  side  by  a  jail,  on  the  other 
by  a  big  stable  barrack.  In  front,  right 
under  the  windows,  ran  the  elevated 
trains,  so  close  that  to  open  the  windows 
was  impossible,  for  the  noise  and  dirt. 
Back  of  it  they  were  putting  up  a  build- 
ing which,  when  completed,  would  hug 
the  rear  wall  so  that  you  couldn't  open 
the  windows  there  at  all. 

After  nightfall  you  would  have  found  in 
that   house   two   frail   little   women.     One 

139 


140  NEIGHBORS 

of  them  taught  school  by  day  in  the  out- 
lying districts  of  the  city,  miles  and  miles 
away,  across  the  East  River.  By  night 
she  came  there  to  sleep,  and  to  be  near  her 
neighbors. 

And  who  were  these  neighbors  ? 
Drunken,  dissolute  women,  vile  brothels 
and  viler  saloons,  for  the  saloon  trafficked 
in  the  vice  of  the  other.  Those  who  lived 
there  were  Northfield  graduates,  girls  of 
refinement  and  modesty.  Yet  these  were 
the  neighbors  they  had  chosen  for  their 
own.  At  all  hours  of  the  night  the  bell 
would  ring,  and  they  would  come,  some- 
times attended  by  policemen.  Said  one 
of  these : 

"We  have  this  case.  She  isn't  wanted 
in  this  home,  or  in  that  institution.  She 
doesn't     come     under     their     rules.     We 


HEARTSEASE  141 

thought  you  might  stretch  yours  to  take 
her  in.     Else  she  goes  straight  to  the  devil." 

Yes  !  that  was  what  he  said.  And  she : 
"Bless  you;  we  have  no  rules.  Let  her 
come  in."  And  she  took  her  and  put  her 
to  bed. 

In  the  midnight  hour  my  friend  of 
Heartsease  hears  of  a  young  girl,  evi- 
dently a  new-comer,  whom  the  brothel  or 
the  saloon  has  in  its  clutch,  and  she  gets 
out  of  bed,  and,  going  after  her,  demands 
her  sister^  and  gets  her  out  from  the  very 
jaws  of  hell.  Again,  on  a  winter's  night, 
a  drunken  woman  finds  her  way  to  her 
door  —  a  married  woman  with  a  husband 
and  children.  And  she  gets  out  of  her 
warm  bed  again,  and,  when  the  other  is 
herself,  takes  her  home,  never  leaving 
her  till  she  is  safe. 


142  NEIGHBORS 

I  found  her  papering  the  walls  and  paint- 
ing the  floor  in  her  room.  I  said  to  her 
that  I  did  not  think  you  could  do  anything 
with  those  women,  —  and  neither  can  you, 
if  they  are  just  "those  women"  to  you. 
Jesus  could.  One  came  and  sat  at  his 
feet  and  wept,  and  dried  them  with  her 
hair. 

"Oh,"  said  she,  "it  isn't  so!  They 
come,  and  are  glad  to  stay.  I  don't  know 
that  they  are  finally  saved,  that  they  never 
fall  again.  But  here,  anyhow,  we  have 
given  them  a  resting  spell  and  time  to 
think.     And  plenty  turn  good." 

She  told  me  of  a  girl  brought  in  by  her 
brother  as  incorrigible.  No  one  knew 
what  to  do  with  her.  She  stayed  in  that 
atmosphere  of  affection  three  months,  and 
went  forth   to   service.     That  was   nearly 


HEARTSEASE  143 

half  a  year  before,  and  she  had  "stayed 
good."  A  chorus  girl  lived  twelve  years 
with  a  man,  who  then  cast  her  off.  Hearts- 
ease sent  her  out  a  domestic,  at  ten  dollars 
a   month,   and   she,   too,    "stayed    good." 

"I  don't  consider,"  said  the  woman 
of  Heartsease,  simply,  "that  we  are  doing 
it  right,  but  we  will  yet." 

I  looked  at  her,  the  frail  girl  with  this 
unshaken,  unshakable  faith  in  the  right, 
and  asked  her,  not  where  she  got  her 
faith  —  I  knew  that  —  but  where  she  got 
the  money  to  run  the  house.  Alas,  for 
poor  human  nature  that  will  not  accept 
the  promise  that  "all  these  things  shall  be 
added  unto  you  !"     She  laughed. 

"The  rent  is  pledged  by  half  a  dozen 
friends.     The  rest  —  comes." 

"But  how?" 


144  NEIGHBORS 

She  pointed  to  a  lot  of  circulars,  pain- 
fully written  out  in  the  night  watches. 

"We  are  selling  soap  just  now,"  she 
said;  "but  it  is  not  always  soap.  Here," 
patting  a  chair,  "this  is  Larkin's  soap; 
that  chafing-dish  is  green  stamps;  this 
set  of  dishes  is  Mother's  Oats.  We  write 
to  the  people,  you  see,  and  they  buy  the 
things,  and  we  get  the  prizes.  We've 
furnished  the  house  in  that  way.  And 
some  give  us  money.  A  man  offered  to 
give  an  entertainment,  promising  to  give 
us  $450  of  the  receipts.  And  then  the 
Charity  Organization  Society  warned  us 
against  him,  and  we  had  to  give  up  the 
$450,"  with  a  sigh.  But  she  brightened 
up  in  a  moment:  "The  very  next  day  we 
got  $1000  for  our  building  fund.  We 
shall  have  to  move  some  day." 


HEARTSEASE  145 

The  elevated  train  swept  by  the  window 
with  rattle  and  roar.  You  could  have 
touched  it,  so  close  did  it  run.  "I  won't 
let  it  worry  me,"  she  said,  with  her  brave 
little  smile. 

I  listened  to  the  crash  of  the  vanishing 
train,  and  looked  at  the  mean  surround- 
ings, and  my  thoughts  wandered  to  the 
great  school  in  the  Massachusetts  hills 
—  her  school  —  which  I  had  passed  only 
the  day  before.  It  lay  there  beautiful 
in  the  spring  sunlight.  But  something 
better  than  its  sunlight  and  its  green 
hills  had  come  down  here  to  bear  witness 
to  the  faith  which  the  founder  of  North- 
field  preached  all  his  life,  —  this  woman 
who  was  a  neighbor. 

I  forgot  to  ask  in  what  special  church 
fold    she    belonged.     It    didn't    seem    to 


146  NEIGHBORS 

matter.  I  know  that  my  friend,  Sister 
Irene,  who  picked  the  outcast  waifs  from 
the  gutter  where  they  perished  till  she 
came,  was  a  Roman  Catholic,  and  that 
they  both  had  sat  at  the  feet  of  Him  who 
is  all  compassion,  and  had  learned  the 
answer  there  to  the  question  that  awaits 
us  at  the  end  of  our  journey : 

"'I  showed  men  God,'  my  Lord  will  say, 
*As  I  traveled  along  the  King's  highway. 

I  eased  the  sister's  troubled  mind ; 

I  helped  the  blighted  to  be  resigned ; 

I  showed  the  sky  to  the  souls  grown  blind. 
And  what  did  you  ? '  my  Lord  will  say, 
When  we  meet  at  the  end  of  the  King's  highway." 


HIS   CHRISTMAS  GIFT 

"The  prisoner  will  stand,"  droned  out 
the  clerk  in  the  Court  of  General  Sessions. 
"Filippo  Portoghese,  you  are  convicted 
of  assault  with  intent  to  kill.  Have  you 
anything  to  say  why  sentence  should  not 
be  passed  upon  you  ?" 

A  sallow  man  with  a  hopeless  look  in 
his  heavy  eyes  rose  slowly  in  his  seat  and 
stood  facing  the  judge.  There  was  a  pause 
in  the  hum  and  bustle  of  the  court  as  men 
turned  to  watch  the  prisoner.  He  did  not 
look  like  a  man  who  would  take  a  neigh- 
bor's life,  and  yet  so  nearly  had  he  done 
so,  of  set  purpose  it  had  been  abundantly 
proved,   that  his  victim  would  carry  the 

147 


148  NEIGHBORS 

disfiguring  scar  of  the  bullet  to  the  end 
of  his  life,  and  only  by  what  seemed  an 
almost  miraculous  chance  had  escaped 
death.  The  story  as  told  by  witnesses 
and  substantially  uncontradicted  was  this : 
Portoghese  and  Vito  Ammella,  whom 
he  shot,  were  neighbors  under  the  same 
roof.  Ammella  kept  the  grocery  on  the 
ground  floor.  Portoghese  lived  upstairs 
in  the  tenement.  He  was  a  prosperous, 
peaceful  man,  with  a  family  of  bright  chil- 
dren, with  whom  he  romped  and  played 
happily  when  home  from  his  barber  shop. 
The  Black  Hand  fixed  its  evil  eye  upon 
the  family  group  and  saw  its  chance. 
One  day  a  letter  came  demanding  a  thou- 
sand dollars.  Portoghese  put  it  aside  with 
the  comment  that  this  was  New  York, 
not  Italy.     Other  letters  followed,  threat- 


HIS  CHRISTMAS   GIFT  149 

ening  harm  to  his  children.  Portoghese 
paid  no  attention,  but  his  wife  worried. 
One  day  the  baby,  little  Vito,  was  missing, 
and  in  hysterics  she  ran  to  her  husband's 
shop  crying  that  the  Black  Hand  had 
stolen  the  child. 

The  barber  hurried  home  and  sought 
high  and  low.  At  last  he  came  upon  the 
child  sitting  on  Ammella's  doorstep ;  he 
had  wandered  away  and  brought  up  at 
the  grocery;  asked  where  he  had  been, 
the  child  pointed  to  the  store.  Porto- 
ghese flew  in  and  demanded  to  know  what 
Ammella  was  doing  with  his  boy.  The 
grocer  was  in  a  bad  humor,  and  swore 
at  him.  There  was  an  altercation,  and 
Ammella  attacked  the  barber  with  a  broom, 
beating  him  and  driving  him  away  from 
his   door.     Black    with    anger,  Portoghese 


150  NEIGHBORS 

ran  to  his  room  and  returned  with  a 
revolver.  In  the  fight  that  followed  he 
shot  Ammella  through  the  head. 

He  was  arrested  and  thrown  into  jail. 
In  the  hospital  the  grocer  hovered  between 
life  and  death  for  many  weeks.  Portoghese 
lay  in  the  Tombs  awaiting  trial  for  more 
than  a  year,  believing  still  that  he  was  the 
victim  of  a  Black  Hand  conspiracy.  When 
at  last  the  trial  came  on,  his  savings  were 
all  gone,  and  of  the  once  prosperous  and 
happy  man  only  a  shadow  was  left.  He  sat 
in  the  court-room  and  listened  in  moody 
silence  to  the  witnesses  who  told  how  he  had 
unjustly  suspected  and  nearly  murdered  his 
friend.  He  was  speedily  convicted,  and  the 
day  of  his  sentence  was  fixed  for  Christmas 
Eve.  It  was  certain  that  it  would  go  hard 
with  him.     The  Italians  were  too  prone  to 


HIS  CHRISTMAS  GIFT  151 

shoot  and  stab,  said  the  newspapers,  and 
the  judges  were  showing  no  mercy. 

The  witnesses  had  told  the  truth,  but 
there  were  some  things  they  did  not  know 
and  that  did  not  get  into  the  evidence. 
The  prisoner's  wife  was  ill  from  grief  and 
want;  their  savings  of  years  gone  to 
lawyer's  fees,  they  were  on  the  verge  of 
starvation.  The  children  were  hungry. 
With  the  bells  ringing  in  the  glad  holiday, 
they  were  facing  bitter  homelessness  in  the 
winter  streets,  for  the  rent  was  in  arrears  and 
the  landlord  would  not  wait.  And  *'Papa" 
away  now  for  the  second  Christmas,  and 
maybe  for  many  yet  to  come  !  Ten,  the 
lawyer  and  jury  had  said :  this  was  New 
York,  not  Italy.  In  the  Tombs  the  prisoner 
said  it  over  to  himself,  bitterly.  He  had 
thought  only  of  defending  his  own. 


152  NEIGHBORS 

So  now  he  stood  looking  the  judge  and 
the  jury  in  the  face,  yet  hardly  seeing  them. 
He  saw  only  the  prison  gates  opening  for 
him,  and  the  gray  walls  shutting  him  out 
from  his  wife  and  little  ones  for  —  how 
many  Christmases  was  it  ?  One,  two, 
three  —  he  fell  to  counting  them  over 
mentally  and  did  not  hear  when  his  lawyer 
whispered  and  nudged  him  with  his  elbow. 
The  clerk  repeated  his  question,  but  he 
merely  shook  his  head.  What  should  he 
have  to  say  ?  Had  he  not  said  it  to  these 
men  and  they  did  not  believe  him  ?  About 
little  Vito  who  was  lost,  and  his  wife  who 
cried  her  eyes  out  because  of  the  Black 
Hand  letters.     He  — 

There  was  a  step  behind  him,  and  a 
voice  he  knew  spoke.  It  was  the  voice  of 
Ammella,    his    neighbor,    with    whom    he 


'  PLKASE,    YOL  U    HONOR,    LET    THIS    MAN    GO  !      IT    IS    CHRISTMAS." 


HIS  CHRISTMAS  GIFT  153 

used  to  be  friends  before  —  before  that 
day. 

*' Please,  your  Honor,  let  this  man  go  ! 
It  is  Christmas,  and  we  should  have  no 
unkind  thoughts.  I  have  none  against 
Filippo  here,  and  I  ask  you  to  let  him  go." 

It  grew  very  still  in  the  court-room  as 
he  spoke  and  paused  for  an  answer.  Law- 
yers looked  up  from  their  briefs  in  aston- 
ishment. The  jurymen  in  the  box  leaned 
forward  and  regarded  the  convicted  man 
and  his  victim  with  rapt  attention.  Such  a 
plea  had  not  been  heard  in  that  place  before. 
Portoghese  stood  mute ;  the  voice  sounded 
strange  and  far  away  to  him.  He  felt  a 
hand  upon  his  shoulder  that  was  the  hand 
of  a  friend,  and  shifted  his  feet  uncertainly, 
but  made  no  response.  The  gray-haired 
judge  regarded  the  two  gravely  but  kindly. 


154  NEIGHBORS 

"Your  wish  comes  from  a  kind  heart," 
he  said.  *'But  this  man  has  been  con- 
victed. The  law  must  be  obeyed.  There 
is  nothing  in  it  that  allows  us  to  let  a  guilty 
man  go  free." 

The  jurymen  whispered  together  and 
one  of  them  arose. 

"Your  Honor,"  he  said,  "a  higher  law 
than  any  made  by  man  came  into  the  world 
at  Christmas  —  that  we  love  one  another. 
These  men  would  obey  it.  Will  you  not 
let  them  ?  The  jury  pray  as  one  man 
that  you  let  mercy  go  before  justice  on 
this  Holy  Eve." 

A  smile  lit  up  Judge  O'Sullivan's  face. 
"Filippo  Portoghese,"  he  said,  "you  are 
a  very  fortunate  man.  The  law  bids  me 
send  you  to  prison  for  ten  years,  and  but 
for  a  miraculous  chance  would  have  con- 


HIS  CHRISTMAS  GIFT  155 

demned  you  to  death.  But  the  man  you 
maimed  for  life  pleads  for  you,  and  the 
jury  that  convicted  you  begs  that  you 
go  free.  The  Court  remembers  what  you 
have  suffered  and  it  knows  the  pHght  of 
your  family,  upon  whom  the  heaviest 
burden  of  your  punishment  would  fall. 
Go,  then,  to  your  home.  And  to  you, 
gentlemen,  a  happy  holiday  such  as  you 
have  given  him  and  his  !  This  court  stands 
adjourned." 

The  voice  of  the  crier  was  lost  in  a  storm 
of  applause.  The  jury  rose  to  their  feet 
and  cheered  judge,  complainant,  and  de- 
fendant. Portoghese,  who  had  stood  as 
one  dazed,  raised  eyes  that  brimmed  with 
tears  to  the  bench  and  to  his  old  neighbor. 
He  understood  at  last.  Ammella  threw 
his  arm  around  him  and   kissed   him   on 


156  NEIGHBORS 

both  cheeks,  his  disfigured  face  beaming 
with  joy.  One  of  the  jurymen,  a  Jew,  put 
his  hand  impulsively  in  his  pocket,  emptied 
it  into  his  hat,  and  passed  the  hat  to  his 
neighbor.  All  the  others  followed  his  ex- 
ample. The  court  oflScer  dropped  in  half 
a  dollar  as  he  stuffed  its  contents  into  the 
happy  Italian's  pocket.  "For  little  Vito," 
he  said,  and  shook  his  hand. 

"Ah  !"  said  the  foreman  of  the  jury, 
looking  after  the  reunited  friends  leaving 
the  court-room  arm  in  arm;  "it  is  good 
to  live  in  New  York.  A  merry  Christmas 
to  you,  Judge  ! " 


OUR  ROOF   GARDEN  AMONG  THE 
TENEMENTS 

A  YEAR  has  gone  since  we  built  a  roof 
garden  on  top  of  the  gymnasium  that 
took  away  our  children's  playground  by 
filling  up  the  yard.  In  many  ways  it  has 
been  the  hardest  of  all  the  years  we  have 
lived  through  with  our  poor  neighbors. 
Poverty,  illness,  misrepresentation,  and  the 
hottest  and  hardest  of  all  summers  for 
those  who  must  live  in  the  city's  crowds  — 
they  have  all  borne  their  share.  But  to 
the  blackest  cloud  there  is  somewhere  a 
silver  lining  if  you  look  long  enough  and 
hard  enough  for  it,  and  ours  has  been  that 
roof  garden.     It  is  not  a  very  great  affair 

157 


158  NEIGHBORS 

—  some  of  you  readers  would  smile  at  it, 
I  suppose.  There  are  no  palm  trees  and 
no  "pergola,"  just  a  plain  roof  down  in  a 
kind  of  well  with  tall  tenements  all  about. 
Two  big  barrels  close  to  the  wall  tell  their 
own  story  of  how  the  world  is  growing 
up  toward  the  light.  For  they  once  held 
whisky  and  trouble  and  deviltry ;  now 
they  are  filled  with  fresh,  sweet  earth,  and 
beautiful  Japanese  ivy  grows  out  of  them 
and  clings  lovingly  to  the  wall  of  our  house, 
spreading  its  soft,  green  tendrils  farther 
and  farther  each  season,  undismayed  by  the 
winter's  cold.  And  then  boxes  and  boxes 
on  a  brick  parapet,  with  hardy  Golden 
Glow,  scarlet  geraniums,  California  privet, 
and  even  a  venturesome  Crimson  Rambler. 
When  first  we  got  window  boxes  and 
filled   them   with   the   ivy   that   looks   so 


OUR  ROOF  GARDEN  159 

pretty  and  is  seen  so  far,  every  child  in  the 
block  accepted  it  as  an  invitation  to  help 
himself  when  and  how  he  could.  They 
never  touch  it  nowadays.  They  like  it 
too  much.  We  didn't  have  to  tell  them. 
They  do  it  themselves.  When  this  summer 
it  became  necessary  on  account  of  the 
crowd  to  eliminate  the  husky  boys  from 
the  roof  garden  and  we  gave  them  the 
gym  instead  to  romp  in,  they  insisted  on 
paying  their  way.  Free  on  the  roof  was 
one  thing;  this  was  quite  another.  They 
taxed  themselves  two  cents  a  week,  one 
for  the  house,  one  for  the  club  treasury, 
and  they  passed  this  resolution  that  *'any 
boy  wot  shoots  craps  or  swears,  or  makes 
a  row  in  the  house  or  is  disrespectful  to 
Mr.  Smith  or  runs  with  any  crooks,  is 
put  out  of  the  club."     They  were  persuaded 


160  NEIGHBORS 

to  fine  the  offender  a  cent  instead  of  ex- 
pelling him,  and  it  worked  all  right  except 
with  Sammy,  who  arose  to  dispute  the 
equity  of  it  all  and  to  demand  the  organiza- 
tion of  a  club  "where  they  don't  put  a 
feller  out  fer  shootin'  craps  —  wot's  craps  !  ** 
But  I  was  telling  of  the  roof  garden  and 
what  happened  there.  It  was  in  the  long 
vacation  when  it  is  open  from  early  morn- 
ing until  all  the  little  ones  in  the  neighbor- 
hood are  asleep  and  the  house  closes  its 
doors.  All  through  the  day  the  children 
own  the  garden  and  carry  on  their  play 
there.  One  evening  each  week  our  girls' 
club  have  an  "at  home"  on  the  roof,  and 
on  three  nights  the  boys  bring  their  friends 
and  smoke  and  talk.  Wednesday  and 
Friday  are  mothers'  and  children's  nights. 
That  was  when  they  began  it.     The  little 


OUR  ROOF  GARDEN  161 

ones  had  been  telling  stories  of  Cinderella 
and  Red  Riding  Hood  and  Beauty  and 
the  Beast  and  Rebecca  of  Sunnybrook 
Farm,  and  before  they  themselves  realized 
that  they  were  doing  it,  they  were  acting 
them.  The  dramatic  instinct  is  strong 
in  these  children.  The  "princess"  of  the 
fairy  tales  appeals  irresistibly,  Cinderella 
even  more.  The  triumph  of  good  over 
evil  is  rapturously  applauded ;  the  villain 
has  to  look  out  for  himself  —  and  indeed, 
he  had  better  !  Don't  I  know  ?  Have  I 
forgotten  the  time  they  put  me  out  of  the 
theater  in  Copenhagen  for  shrieking 
"Murder!  Police!"  when  the  rascal 
lover  —  nice  lover,  he  !  —  was  on  the 
very  point  of  plunging  a  gleaming  knife 
into  the  heart  of  the  beautiful  maiden 
who   slept    in    an    armchair,    unconscious 


162  NEIGHBORS 

of  her  peril.  And  I  was  sixteen;  these 
are  eight,  or  nine. 

So  the  prince  rode  off  with  Cinderella 
in  front  of  him  on  a  fiery  kindergarten 
chair,  and  the  wicked  sisters  were  left  to 
turn  green  with  envy ;  and  another  prince 
with  black  cotton  mustache,  on  an  even 
more  impetuous  charger,  a  tuft  of  tissue 
paper  in  his  cap  for  a  feather,  galloped  up 
to  release  Beauty  with  a  kiss  from  her 
century  of  sleep;  and  Beauty  awoke  as 
naturally  as  if  she  had  but  just  closed  her 
eyes,  amid  volleys  of  applause  from  the 
roof  and  from  the  tenements,  every  win- 
dow in  which  was  a  reserved  seat. 

Next  the  Bad  Wolf  strode  into  the  ring, 
with  honeyed  speech  to  beguile  little  Red 
Riding  Hood.  The  plays  had  rapidly  be- 
come so  popular   that  a  regular  ring  had 


OUR  ROOF   GARDEN  163 

to  be  made  on  the  roof  for  a  stage.  When 
the  seats  gave  out,  chalk  lines  took  their 
place  and  the  children  and  their  mothers 
sat  on  them  with  all  the  gravity  befitting 
the  dress-circle.  Red  Riding  Hood  having 
happily  escaped  being  eaten  alive,  Rebecca 
rode  by  with  cheery  smile  and  pink  parasol, 
as  full  of  sunshine  as  the  brook  on  her 
home  farm.  The  children  shouted  their 
delight. 

"Where  do  you  get  it  all?"  asked  one 
who  did  not  know  of  our  dog-eared  library 
they  grew  up  with  before  the  Carnegie 
branch  came  and  we  put  ours  in  the  attic. 

"We  know  the  story  —  all  we  have  to 
do  is  to  act  it,"  was  the  children's  reply. 
And  act  it  they  did,  until  the  report  went 
abroad  that  at  the  Riis  House  there  was 
a  prime  show  every  Wednesday  and  Friday 


164  NEIGHBORS 

night.  That  was  when  the  schools  re- 
opened and  the  recreation  center  at  No.  1 
in  the  next  block  was  closed.  Then  its 
crowds  came  and  besieged  our  house  until 
the  street  was  jammed  and  traffic  impossi- 
ble. For  the  first  and  only  time  in  its 
history  a  policeman  had  to  be  placed  on 
the  stoop,  or  we  should  have  been  swamped 
past  hope.  But  he  is  gone  long  ago. 
Don't  let  him  deter  you  from  calling. 

The  nights  are  cold  now,  and  Cinderella 
rides  no  more  on  the  prancing  steed  of  her 
fairy  prince.  The  children's  songs  have 
ceased.  Beauty  and  the  Beast  are  tucked 
away  with  the  ivy  and  the  bulbs  and  the 
green  shrubs  against  the  bright  sunny 
days  that  are  coming.  The  wolf  is  a  bad 
memory,  and  the  tenement  windows  that 
were  filled  with  laughing  faces  are  vacant 


OUR  ROOF  GARDEN  165 

and  shut.  But  many  a  child  smiles  in  its 
sleep,  dreaming  of  the  happy  hours  in  our 
roof  garden,  and  many  a  mother's  heavy 
burden  was  lightened  because  of  it  and 
because  of  the  children's  joy.  The  garden 
was  an  afterthought  —  we  had  taken  their 
playground  in  the  yard,  and  there  was  the 
wide  roof.  It  seemed  as  though  it  ought 
to  be  put  to  use.  They  said  flowers 
wouldn't  grow  down  in  that  hole,  and  that 
the  neighbors  would  throw  things,  and  any- 
way the  children  would  despoil  them.  Well, 
they  did  grow,  never  better,  and  the  whole 
block  grew  up  to  them.  Their  message 
went  into  every  tenement  house  home. 
Not  the  crabbedest  old  bachelor  ever  threw 
anything  on  our  roof  to  disgrace  it;  and 
as  for  the  children,  they  loved  the  flowers. 
That  tells  it  all.     The  stone  we  made  light 


166  NEIGHBORS 

of  proved  the  cornerstone  of  the  build- 
ing. There  is  nothing  in  our  house,  full 
as  it  is  of  a  hundred  activities  to  bring 
sweetening  touch  to  weary  lives,  that  has 
half  the  cheer  in  it  which  our  roof  garden 
holds  in  summer,  nothing  that  has  ten- 
derer memories  for  us  all  the  year  round. 
That  is  the  story  of  the  flowers  in  one 
garden  as  big  as  the  average  back  yard, 
and  of  the  girls  who  took  them  to  their 
hearts.  For,  of  course,  it  was  the  girls 
who  did  it.  The  boys  —  well  !  boys  are 
boys  in  Henry  Street  as  on  Madison  Avenue. 
Perhaps  on  ours  there  is  a  trifle  less  veneer- 
ing. They  had  a  party  to  end  up  with, 
and  ice-cream,  lots  of  it.  But  as  the 
mothers  couldn't  come,  it  being  wash- 
day or  something,  and  they  didn't  want 
their  sisters  —  they  were  hardly  old  enough 


OUR  ROOF  GARDEN  167 

to  see  the  advantage  of  swapping  them 
over  —  they  had  to  eat  it  themselves,  all 
of  it.  I  am  not  even  sure  they  didn't 
plan  it  so.  The  one  redeeming  feature 
was  that  they  treated  the  workers  liber- 
ally first.  Else  they  might  have  died  of 
indigestion.  Whether  they  planned  that, 
too,  I  wonder. 


THE  SNOW  BABIES'   CHRISTMAS 

"All  aboard  for  Coney  Island!"  The 
gates  of  the  bridge  train  slammed,  the 
whistle  shrieked,  and  the  cars  rolled  out 
past  rows  of  houses  that  grew  smaller 
and  lower  to  Jim's  wondering  eyes,  until 
they  quite  disappeared  beneath  the  track. 
He  felt  himself  launching  forth  above 
the  world  of  men,  and  presently  he  saw, 
deep  down  below,  the  broad  stream  with 
ships  and  ferry-boats  and  craft  going  dif- 
ferent ways,  just  like  the  tracks  and  traflSc 
in  a  big,  wide  street;  only  so  far  away 
was  it  all  that  the  pennant  on  the  top- 
mast of  a  vessel  passing  directly  under  the 
train  seemed  as  if  it  did  not  belong  to  his 

168 


THE  SNOW  BABIES'  CHRISTMAS     169 

world  at  all.  Jim  followed  the  white  foam 
in  the  wake  of  the  sloop  with  fascinated 
stare,  until  a  puffing  tug  bustled  across 
its  track  and  wiped  it  out.  Then  he 
settled  back  in  his  seat  with  a  sigh  that 
had  been  pent  up  within  him  twenty  long, 
wondering  minutes  since  he  limped  down 
the  Subway  at  Twenty-third  Street.  It 
was  his  first  journey  abroad. 

Jim  had  never  been  to  the  Brooklyn 
Bridge  before.  It  is  doubtful  if  he  had 
ever  heard  of  it.  If  he  had,  it  was  as  of 
something  so  distant,  so  unreal,  as  to  have 
been  quite  within  the  realm  of  fairyland, 
had  his  life  experience  included  fairies. 
It  had  not.  Jim's  frail  craft  had  been 
launched  in  Little  Italy,  half  a  dozen 
miles  or  more  up -town,  and  there  it  had 
been    moored,    its    rovings    being    limited 


170  NEIGHBORS 

at  the  outset  by  babyhood  and  the  tene- 
ment, and  later  on  by  the  wreck  that  had 
made  of  him  a  castaway  for  life.  A  mys- 
terious something  had  attacked  one  of 
Jim's  ankles,  and,  despite  ointments  and 
lotions  prescribed  by  the  wise  women  of 
the  tenement,  had  eaten  into  the  bone 
and  stayed  there.  At  nine  the  lad  was  a 
cripple  with  one  leg  shorter  than  the  other 
by  two  or  three  inches,  with  a  stepmother, 
a  squalling  baby  to  mind  for  his  daily 
task,  hard  words  and  kicks  for  his  wage; 
for  Jim  was  an  unprofitable  investment, 
promising  no  returns,  but,  rather,  constant 
worry  and  outlay.  The  outlook  was  not 
the  most  cheering  in  the  world. 

But,  happily,  Jim  was  little  concerned 
about  things  to  come.  He  lived  in  the 
day  that  is,  fighting  his  way  as  he  could 


THE  SNOW  BABIES'  CHRISTMAS    171 

with  a  leg  and  a  half  and  a  nickname,  — 
"Gimpy"  they  called  him  for  his  limp, 
—  and  getting  out  of  it  what  a  fellow  so 
handicapped  could.  After  all,  there  were 
compensations.  When  the  gang  scattered 
before  the  cop,  it  did  not  occur  to  him  to 
lay  any  of  the  blame  to  Gimpy,  though 
the  little  lad  with  the  pinched  face  and 
sharp  eyes  had,  in  fact,  done  scouting 
duty  most  craftily.  It  was  partly  in 
acknowledgment  of  such  services,  partly 
as  a  concession  to  his  sharper  wits,  that 
Gimpy  was  tacitly  allowed  a  seat  in  the 
councils  of  the  Cave  Gang,  though  in  the 
far  "kid"  corner.  He  limped  through 
their  campaigns  with  them,  learned  to 
swim  by  "dropping  off  the  dock"  at  the 
end  of  the  street  into  the  swirling  tide,  and 
once  nearly  lost  his  life  when  one  of  the 


172  NEIGHBORS 

bigger  boys  dared  him  to  run  through  an 
election  bonfire  like  his  able-bodied  com- 
rades. Gimpy  started  to  do  it  at  once, 
but  stumbled  and  fell,  and  was  all  but 
burned  to  death  before  the  other  boys 
could  pull  him  out.  This  act  of  bravado 
earned  him  full  membership  in  the  gang, 
despite  his  tender  years ;  and,  indeed,  it 
is  doubtful  if  in  all  that  region  there  was 
a  lad  of  his  age  as  tough  and  loveless  as 
Gimpy.  The  one  affection  of  his  barren 
life  was  the  baby  that  made  it  slavery  by 
day.  But,  somehow,  there  was  that  in 
its  chubby  foot  groping  for  him  in  its 
baby  sleep,  or  in  the  little  round  head 
pillowed  on  his  shoulder,  that  more  than 
made  up  for  it  all. 

Ill  luck  was  surely  Gimpy 's  portion.     It 
was  not  a  month  after  he  had  returned 


THE  SNOW  BABIES'  CHRISTMAS    173 

to  the  haunts  of  the  gang,  a  battle-scarred 
veteran  now  since  his  encounter  with  the 
bonfire,  when  "the  Society's"  officers  held 
up  the  huckster's  wagon  from  which  he 
was  crying  potatoes  with  his  thin,  shrill 
voice,  which  somehow  seemed  to  convey 
the  note  of  pain  that  was  the  prevailing 
strain  of  his  life.  They  made  Gimpy  a 
prisoner,  limp,  stick,  and  all.  The  in- 
quiry that  ensued  as  to  his  years  and  home 
setting,  the  while  Gimpy  was  undergoing 
the  incredible  experience  of  being  washed 
and  fed  regularly  three  times  a  day,  set 
in  motion  the  train  of  events  that  was  at 
present  hurrying  him  toward  Coney  Island 
in  midwinter,  with  a  snow-storm  draping 
the  land  in  white  far  and  near,  as  the  train 
sped  seaward.  He  gasped  as  he  reviewed 
the  hurrying  events  of  the  week :   the  visit 


174  NEIGHBORS 

of  the  doctor  from  Sea  Breeze,  who  had 
scrutinized  his  ankle  as  if  he  expected  to 
find  some  of  the  swag  of  the  last  raid  hid- 
den somewhere  about  it.  Gimpy  never 
took  his  eyes  off  him  during  the  examina- 
tion. No  word  or  cry  escaped  him  when 
it  hurt  most,  but  his  bright,  furtive  eyes 
never  left  the  doctor  or  lost  one  of  his 
movements.  *'Just  like  a  weasel  caught 
in  a  trap,"  said  the  doctor,  speaking  of  his 
charge  afterward. 

But  when  it  was  over,  he  clapped  Gimpy 
on  the  shoulder  and  said  it  was  all  right. 
He  was  sure  he  could  help. 

"Have  him  at  the  Subway  to-morrow  at 
twelve,"  was  his  parting  direction;  and 
Gimpy  had  gone  to  bed  to  dream  that  he 
was  being  dragged  down  the  stone  stairs 
by  three  helmeted   men,   to  be  fed   to  a 


THE   SNOW  BABIES'   CHRISTMAS    175 

monster  breathing  fire  and  smoke  at  the 
foot  of  the  stairs. 

Now  his  wondering  journey  was  dis- 
turbed by  a  cheery  voice  beside  him. 
"Well,  bub,  ever  see  that  before.'^"  and 
the  doctor  pointed  to  the  gray  ocean  line 
dead  ahead.  Gimpy  had  not  seen  it,  but 
he  knew  well  enough  what  it  was. 

"It's  the  river,"  he  said,  "that  I  cross 
when  I  go  to  Italy." 

"Right !"  and  his  companion  held  out 
a  helping  hand  as  the  train  pulled  up  at 
the  end  of  the  journey.  "Now  let's  see 
how  we  can  navigate." 

And,  indeed,  there  was  need  of  seeing 
about  it.  Right  from  the  step  of  the 
train  the  snow  lay  deep,  a  pathless  waste 
burying  street  and  sidewalk  out  of  sight, 
blocking   the   closed    and    barred    gate    of 


176  NEIGHBORS 

Dreamland,  of  radiant  summer  memory, 
and  stalling  the  myriad  hobby-horses  of 
shows  that  slept  their  long  winter  sleep. 
Not  a  whinny  came  on  the  sharp  salt 
breeze.  The  strident  voice  of  the  car- 
penter's saw  and  the  rat-tat-tat  of  his 
hammer  alone  bore  witness  that  there 
was  life  somewhere  in  the  white  desert. 
The  doctor  looked  in  dismay  at  Gimpy's 
brace  and  high  shoe,  and  shook  his  head. 
"He  never  can  do  it.  Hello,  there  !" 
An  express  wagon  had  come  into  view 
around  the  corner  of  the  shed.  "Here's 
a  job  for  you."  And  before  he  could  have 
said  Jack  Robinson,  Gimpy  felt  himself 
hoisted  bodily  into  the  wagon  and  de- 
posited there  like  any  express  package. 
From  somewhere  a  longish  something  that 
proved  to  be  a  Christmas-tree,  very  much 


THE  SNOW  BABIES'  CHRISTMAS    177 

wrapped  and  swathed  about,  came  to  keep 
him  company.  The  doctor  climbed  up  by 
the  driver,  and  they  were  off.  Gimpy  re- 
called with  a  dull  sense  of  impending 
events  in  which  for  once  he  had  no  shap- 
ing hand,  as  he  rubbed  his  ears  where  the 
bitter  blast  pinched,  that  to-morrow  was 
Christmas. 

A  strange  group  was  that  which  gathered 
about  the  supper-table  at  Sea  Breeze  that 
night.  It  would  have  been  sufficiently 
odd  to  any  one  anywhere ;  but  to  Gimpy, 
washed,  in  clean,  comfortable  raiment, 
with  his  bad  foot  set  in  a  firm  bandage, 
and  for  once  no  longer  sore  with  the  pain 
that  had  racked  his  frame  from  baby- 
hood, it  seemed  so  unreal  that  once  or 
twice  he  pinched  himself  covertly  to  see 
if  he  were  really  awake.     They  came  weakly 


178  NEIGHBORS 

stumping  with  sticks  and  crutches  and  on 
club  feet,  the  lame  and  the  halt,  the  chil- 
dren of  sorrow  and  suffering  from  the  city 
slums,  and  stood  leaning  on  crutch  or 
chair  for  support  while  they  sang  their 
simple  grace;  but  neither  in  their  clear 
childish  voices  nor  yet  in  the  faces  that 
were  turned  toward  Gimpy  in  friendly 
scrutiny  as  the  last  comer,  was  there 
trace  of  pain.  Their  cheeks  were  ruddy 
and  their  eyes  bright  with  the  health  of 
outdoors,  and  when  they  sang  about  the 
"Frog  in  the  Pond,"  in  response  to  a 
spontaneous  demand,  laughter  bubbled 
over  around  the  table.  Gimpy,  sizing  his 
fellow-boarders  up  according  to  the  stand- 
ards of  the  gang,  with  the  mental  con- 
clusion that  he  "could  lick  the  bunch," 
felt  a  warm  little  hand  worming  its  way 


THE   SNOW  BABIES'   CHRISTMAS     179 

into  his,  and,  looking  into  a  pair  of  trustful 
baby  eyes,  choked  with  a  sudden  reminis- 
cent pang,  but  smiled  back  at  his  friend 
and  felt  suddenly  at  home.  Little  Ellen, 
with  the  pervading  affections,  had  added 
him  to  her  famiPy  of  brothers.  What 
honors  were  in  store  for  him  in  that  rela- 
tion Gimpy  never  guessed.  Ellen  left  no 
one  out.  When  summer  came  again  she 
enlarged  the  family  further  by  adopting 
the  President  of  the  United  States  as  her 
papa,  when  he  came  visiting  to  Sea  Breeze ; 
and  by  rights  Gimpy  should  have  achieved 
a  pull  such  as  would  have  turned  the  boss 
of  his  ward  green  with  envy. 

It  appeared  speedily  that  something 
unusual  was  on  foot.  There  was  a  sub- 
dued excitement  among  the  children  which 
his  experience  diagnosed  at  first  flush  as 


180  NEIGHBORS 

the  symptoms  of  a  raid.  But  the  fact 
that  in  all  the  waste  of  snow  on  the  way 
over  he  had  seen  nothing  rising  to  the 
apparent  dignity  of  candy-shop  or  grocery- 
store  made  him  dismiss  the  notion  as 
untenable.  Presently  unfamiliar  doings 
developed.  The  children  who  could  write 
scribbled  notes  on  odd  sheets  of  paper, 
which  the  nurses  burned  in  the  fireplace 
with  solemn  incantations.  Something  in 
the  locked  dining-room  was  an  object  of 
pointed  interest.  Things  were  going  on 
there,  and  expeditions  to  penetrate  the 
mystery  were  organized  at  brief  inter- 
vals, and  as  often  headed  off  by  watchful 
nurses. 

When,  finally,  the  children  were  gotten 
upstairs  and  undressed,  from  the  head- 
post  of  each  of  thirty-six  beds  there  swung 


THE  SNOW  BABIES'  CHRISTMAS     181 

a  little  stocking,  limp  and  yawning  with 
mute  appeal.  Gimpy  had  "caught  on" 
by  this  time :  it  was  a  wishing-bee,  and 
old  Santa  Claus  was  supposed  to  jBlI  the 
stockings  with  what  each  had  most 
desired.  The  consultation  over,  baby 
George  had  let  him  into  the  game.  Baby 
George  did  not  know  enough  to  do  his 
own  wishing,  and  the  thirty-five  took  it 
in  hand  while  he  was  being  put  to  bed. 
"Let's  wish  for  some  little  dresses  for 
him,"  said  big  Mariano,  who  was  the 
baby's  champion  and  court  of  last  resort; 
"that's  what  he  needs."  And  it  was  done. 
Gimpy  smiled  a  little  disdainfully  at  the 
credulity  of  the  "kids."  The  Santa  Claus 
fake  was  out  of  date  a  long  while  in  his 
tenement.  But  he  voted  for  baby  George's 
dresses,  all  the  same,  and  even  went  to 


182  NEIGHBORS 

the  length  of  recording  his  own  wish  for 
a  good  baseball  bat.  Gimpy  was  coming 
on. 

Going  to  bed  in  that  queer  place  fairly 
"stumped"  Gimpy.  "Peelin"'  had  been 
the  simplest  of  processes  in  Little  Italy. 
Here  they  pulled  a  fellow's  clothes  off 
only  to  put  on  another  lot,  heavier  every 
way,  with  sweater  and  hood  and  flannel 
socks  and  mittens  to  boot,  as  if  the  boy 
were  bound  for  a  tussle  with  the  storm 
outside  rather  than  for  his  own  warm  bed. 
And  so,  in  fact,  he  was.  For  no  sooner 
had  he  been  tucked  under  the  blankets, 
warm  and  snug,  than  the  nurses  threw 
open  all  the  windows,  every  one,  and  let 
the  gale  from  without  surge  in  and  through 
as  it  listed ;  and  so  they  left  them.  Gimpy 
shivered  as  he  felt  the  frosty  breath  of 


THE  SNOW  BABIES'  CHRISTMAS     183 

the  ocean  nipping  his  nose,  and  crept 
under  the  blanket  for  shelter.  But  pres- 
ently he  looked  up  and  saw  the  other 
boys  snoozing  happily  like  so  many  little 
Eskimos  equipped  for  the  North  Pole, 
and  decided  to  keep  them  company.  For 
a  while  he  lay  thinking  of  the  strange 
things  that  had  happened  that  day,  since 
his  descent  into  the  Subway.  If  the  gang 
could  see  him  now.  But  it  seemed  far 
away,  with  all  his  past  life  —  farther  than 
the  river  with  the  ships  deep  down  below. 
Out  there  upon  the  dark  waters,  in  the 
storm,  were  they  sailing  now,  and  all  the 
lights  of  the  city  swallowed  up  in  gloom  ? 
Presently  he  heard  through  it  all  the 
train  roaring  far  off  in  the  Subway  and 
many  hurrying  feet  on  the  stairs.  The 
iron   gates   clanked  —  and   he   fell   asleep 


184  NEIGHBORS 

with  the  song  of  the  sea  for  his  hillaby. 
Mother  Nature  had  gathered  her  child 
to  her  bosom,  and  the  slum  had  lost  in 
the  battle  for  a  life. 

The  clock  had  not  struck  two  when 
from  the  biggest  boy's  bed  in  the  corner 
there  came  in  a  clear,  strong  alto  the 
strains  of  "Ring,  ring,  happy  bells  !"  and 
from  every  room  childish  voices  chimed 
in.  The  nurses  hurried  to  stop  the  chorus 
with  the  message  that  it  was  yet  five 
hours  to  daylight.  They  were  up,  trim- 
ming the  tree  in  the  dining-room;  at  the 
last  moment  the  crushing  announcement 
had  been  made  that  the  candy  had  been 
forgotten,  and  a  midnight  expedition  had 
set  out  for  the  city  through  the  storm  to 
procure  it.  A  semblance  of  order  was 
restored,   but  cat  naps   ruled   after  that, 


THE  SNOW  BABIES'  CHRISTMAS    185 

till,  at  daybreak,  a  gleeful  shout  from 
Ellen's  bed  proclaimed  that  Santa  Claus 
had  been  there,  in  very  truth,  and  had 
left  a  dolly  in  her  stocking.  It  was  the 
signal  for  such  an  uproar  as  had  not  been 
heard  on  that  beach  since  Port  Arthur  fell 
for  the  last  time  upon  its  defenders  three 
months  before.  From  thirty-six  stockings 
came  forth  a  veritable  army  of  tops,  balls, 
wooden  animals  of  unknown  pedigree, 
oranges,  music-boxes,  and  cunning  little 
pocket-books,  each  with  a  shining  silver 
quarter  in,  love-tokens  of  one  in  the  great 
city  whose  heart  must  have  been  light 
with  happy  dreams  in  that  hour.  Gimpy 
drew  forth  from  his  stocking  a  very  able- 
bodied  baseball  bat  and  considered  it 
with  a  stunned  look.  Santa  Claus  was  a 
fake,  but  the  bat  —  there  was  no  denying 


186  NEIGHBORS 

that,  and  he  had  wished  for  one  the  very 
last  thing  before  he  fell  asleep  ! 

Daylight  struggled  still  with  a  heavy 
snow-squall  when  the  signal  was  given 
for  the  carol  "Christmas  time  has  come 
again,"  and  the  march  down  to  breakfast. 
That  march  !  On  the  third  step  the  carol 
was  forgotten  and  the  band  broke  into  one 
long  cheer  that  was  kept  up  till  the  door 
of  the  dining-room  was  reached.  At  the 
first  glimpse  within,  baby  George's  wail 
rose  loud  and  grievous:  "My  chair!  my 
chair!"  But  it  died  in  a  shriek  of  joy  as 
he  saw  what  it  was  that  had  taken  its 
place.  There  stood  the  Christmas-tree, 
one  mass  of  shining  candles,  and  silver 
and  gold,  and  angels  with  wings,  and 
wondrous  things  of  colored  paper  all  over 
it    from    top    to    bottom.     Gimpy's    eyes 


THE  SNOW  BABIES'  CHRISTMAS     187 

sparkled  at  the  sight,  skeptic  though  he 
was  at  nine ;  and  in  the  depths  of  his  soul 
he  came  over,  then  and  there,  to  Santa 
Claus,  to  abide  forever  —  only  he  did  not 
know  it  yet. 

To  make  the  children  eat  any  breakfast, 
with  three  gay  sleds  waiting  to  take  the 
girls  out  in  the  snow,  was  no  easy  matter; 
but  it  was  done  at  last,  and  they  swarmed 
forth  for  a  holiday  in  the  open.  All  days 
are  spent  in  the  open  at  Sea  Breeze,  —  even 
the  school  is  a  tent,  —  and  very  cold  weather 
only  shortens  the  brief  school  hour;  but 
this  day  was  to  be  given  over  to  play 
altogether.  Winter  it  was  "for  fair,"  but 
never  was  coasting  enjoyed  on  New  Eng- 
land hills  as  these  sledding  journeys  on 
the  sands  where  the  surf  beat  in  with  crash 
of  thunder.     The  sea  itself  had  joined  in 


188  NEIGHBORS 

making  Christmas  for  its  little  friends. 
The  day  before,  a  regiment  of  crabs  had 
come  ashore  and  surrendered  to  the  cook 
at  Sea  Breeze.  Christmas  morn  found 
the  children's  "floor"  —  they  called  the 
stretch  of  clean,  hard  sand  between  high- 
water  mark  and  the  surf -line  by  that  name 
—  filled  with  gorgeous  shells  and  pebbles, 
and  strange  fishes  left  there  by  the  tide 
overnight.  The  fair-weather  friends  who 
turn  their  backs  upon  old  ocean  with  the 
first  rude  blasts  of  autumn  little  know 
what  wonderful  surprises  it  keeps  for  those 
who  stand  by  it  in  good  and  in  evil  report. 
When  the  very  biggest  turkey  that  ever 
strutted  in  barnyard  was  discovered  steam- 
ing in  the  middle  of  the  dinner-table  and 
the  report  went  round  in  whispers  that 
ice-cream  had  been  seen  carried  in  in  pails, 


THE  SNOW  BABIES'  CHRISTMAS     189 

and  when,  in  response  to  a  pull  at,  the 
bell.  Matron  Thomsen  ushered  in  a  squad 
of  smiling  mamas  and  papas  to  help  eat 
the  dinner,  even  Gimpy  gave  in  to  the 
general  joy,  and  avowed  that  Christmas 
was  "bully."  Perhaps  his  acceptance  of 
the  fact  was  made  easier  by  a  hasty  survey 
of  the  group  of  papas  and  mamas,  which 
assured  him  that  his  own  were  not  among 
them.  A  fleeting  glimpse  of  the  baby, 
deserted  and  disconsolate,  brought  the  old 
pucker  to  his  brow  for  a  passing  moment; 
but  just  then  big  Fred  set  off  a  snapper 
at  his  very  ear,  and  thrusting  a  pea-green 
fool's-cap  upon  his  head,  pushed  him  into 
the  roistering  procession  that  hobbled  round 
and  round  the  table,  cheering  fit  to  burst. 
And  the  babies  that  had  been  brought 
down  from  their  cribs,  strapped,  because 


190  NEIGHBORS 

their  backs  were  crooked,  in  the  frames 
that  look  so  cruel  and  are  so  kind,  lifted 
up  their  feeble  voices  as  they  watched 
the  show  with  shining  eyes.  Little  baby 
Helen,  who  could  only  smile  and  wave 
*'by-by"  with  one  fat  hand,  piped  in  with 
her  tiny  voice,  "Here  I  is  !"  It  was  all 
she  knew,  and  she  gave  that  with  a  right 
good  will,  which  is  as  much  as  one  can  ask 
of  anybody,  even  of  a  snow  baby. 

If  there  were  still  lacking  a  last  link  to 
rivet  Gimpy's  loyalty  to  his  new  home 
for  good  and  all,  he  himself  supplied  it 
when  the  band  gathered  under  the  leafless 
trees  —  for  Sea  Breeze  has  a  grove  in 
summer,  the  only  one  on  the  island  — 
and  whiled  away  the  afternoon  making 
a  "park"  in  the  snow,  with  sea-shells 
for  curbing  and  boundary  stones.     When 


THE  SNOW  BABIES'  CHRISTMAS     191 

it  was  all  but  completed,  Gimpy,  with  an 
inspiration  that  then  and  there  installed 
him  leader,  gave  it  the  finishing  touch  by 
drawing  a  policeman  on  the  corner  with  a 
club,  and  a  sign,  "Keep  off  the  grass." 
Together  they  gave  it  the  air  of  reality 
and  the  true  local  color  that  made  them 
feel,  one  and  all,  that  now  indeed  they 
were  at  home. 

Toward  evening  a  snow-storm  blew  in 
from  the  sea,  but  instead  of  scurrying  for 
shelter,  the  little  Eskimos  joined  the  doctor 
in  hauling  wood  for  a  big  bonfire  on  the 
beach.  There,  while  the  surf  beat  upon 
the  shore  hardly  a  dozen  steps  away, 
and  the  storm  whirled  the  snow-clouds  in 
weird  drifts  over  sea  and  land,  they  drew 
near  the  fire,  and  heard  the  doctor  tell 
stories  that  seemed  to  come  right  out  of 


192  NEIGHBORS 

the  darkness  and  grow  real  while  they 
listened.  Dr.  Wallace  is  a  Southerner  and 
lived  his  childhood  with  Br'er  Rabbit  and 
Mr.  Fox,  and  they  saw  them  plainly  gam- 
boling in  the  firelight  as  the  story  went 
on.  For  the  doctor  knows  boys  and  loves 
them,  that  is  how. 

No  one  would  have  guessed  that  they 
were  cripples,  every  one  of  that  rugged 
band  that  sat  down  around  the  Christmas 
supper-table,  rosy-cheeked  and  jolly  — 
cripples  condemned,  but  for  Sea  Breeze, 
to  lives  of  misery  and  pain,  most  of  them 
to  an  early  death  and  suffering  to  others. 
For  their  enemy  was  that  foe  of  mankind, 
the  White  Plague,  that  for  thousands  of 
years  has  taken  tithe  and  toll  of  the  igno- 
rance and  greed  and  selfishness  of  man, 
which  sometimes  we  call  with  one  name  — • 


THE  SNOW  BABIES'  CHRISTMAS     193 

the  slum.  Gimpy  never  would  have 
dreamed  that  the  tenement  held  no  worse 
threat  for  the  baby  he  yearned  for  than 
himself,  with  his  crippled  foot,  when  he 
was  there.  These  things  you  could  not 
have  told  even  the  fathers  and  mothers; 
or  if  you  had,  no  one  there  but  the  doctor 
and  the  nurses  would  have  believed  you. 
They  knew  only  too  well.  But  two  things 
you  could  make  out,  with  no  trouble  at  all, 
by  the  lamplight :  one,  that  they  were 
one  and  all  on  the  homeward  stretch  to 
health  and  vigor  —  Gimpy  himself  was  a 
different  lad  from  the  one  who  had  crept 
shivering  to  bed  the  night  before ;  and  this 
other,  that  they  were  the  sleepiest  crew 
of  youngsters  ever  got  together.  Before 
they  had  finished  the  first  verse  of 
"America"  as  their  good  night,  standing 


194  NEIGHBORS 

up  like  little  men,  half  of  them  were  down 
and  asleep  with  their  heads  pillowed  upon 
their  arms.  And  so  Miss  Brass,  the  head 
nurse,  gathered  them  in  and  off  to  bed. 

"And  now,  boys,"  she  said  as  they  were 
being  tucked  in,  "your  prayers."  And 
of  those  who  were  awake  each  said  his 
own :  Willie  his  "Now  I  lay  me,"  Mariano 
his  "Ave,"  but  little  Bent  from  the  East- 
side  tenement  wailed  that  he  didn't  have 
any.     Bent  was  a  newcomer  like  Gimpy. 

"Then,"  said  six-year-old  Morris,  reso- 
lutely,—  he  also  was  a  Jew,  —  "I  learn 
him  mine  vat  my  fader  tol'  me."  And 
getting  into  Bent's  crib,  he  crept  under 
the  blanket  with  his  little  comrade.  Gimpy 
saw  them  reverently  pull  their  worsted 
caps  down  over  their  heads,  and  presently 
their   tiny   voices   whispered   together,    in 


THE  SNOW  BABIES'  CHRISTMAS     195 

the  jargon  of  the  East  Side,  their  petition 
to  the  Father  of  all,  who  looked  lovingly- 
down  through  the  storm  upon  his  children 
of  many  folds. 

The  last  prayer  was  said,  and  all  was 
still.  Through  the  peaceful  breathing  of 
the  boys  all  about  him,  Gimpy,  alone  wake- 
ful, heard  the  deep  bass  of  the  troubled 
sea.  The  storm  had  blown  over.  Through 
the  open  windows  shone  the  eternal  stars, 
as  on  that  night  in  the  Judean  hills  when 
shepherds  herded  their  flocks  and 

"The  angels  of  the  Lord  came  down." 

He  did  not  know.  He  was  not  thinking  of 
angels;  none  had  ever  come  to  his  slum. 
But  a  great  peace  came  over  him  and  filled 
his  child-soul.  It  may  be  that  the  nurse 
saw  it  shining  in  his  eyes  and  thought  it 


196  NEIGHBORS 

fever.  It  may  be  that  she,  too,  was  think- 
ing in  that  holy  hour.  She  bent  over  him 
and  laid  a  soothing  hand  upon  his  brow. 

"You  must  sleep  now,"  she  said. 

Something  that  was  not  of  the  tenement, 
something  vital,  with  which  his  old  life 
had  no  concern,  welled  up  in  Gimpy  at 
the  touch.  He  caught  her  hand  and  held 
it. 

"I  will  if  you  will  sit  here,"  he  said. 
He  could  not  help  it. 

"Why,  Jimmy  .f^"  She  stroked  back  his 
shock  of  stubborn  hair.  Something  glis- 
tened on  her  eyelashes  as  she  looked 
at  the  forlorn  little  face  on  the  pillow. 
How  should  Gimpy  know  that  he  was  at 
that  moment  leading  another  struggling 
soul  by  the  hand  toward  the  light  that 
never  dies  ? 


THE  SNOW  BABIES'  CHRISTMAS     197 

"'Cause,"  he  gulped  hard,  but  finished 
manfully  —  '"cause  I  love  you." 

Gimpy  had  learned  the  lesson  of  Christ- 
mas, 

"And  glory  shone  around." 


AS  TOLD  BY  THE  RABBI 

Three  stories  have  come  to  me  out 
of  the  past  for  which  I  would  make  friends 
in  the  present.  The  first  I  have  from  a 
rabbi  of  our  own  day  whom  I  met  last 
winter  in  the  far  Southwest.  The  other 
two  were  drawn  from  the  wisdom  of  the 
old  rabbis  that  is  as  replete  with  human 
contradiction  as  the  strange  people  of 
whose  life  it  was,  and  is,  a  part.  If  they 
help  us  to  understand  how  near  we  live  to 
one  another,  after  all,  it  is  well.  Without 
other  comment,  I  shall  leave  each  reader 
to  make  his  own  application  of  them. 

This  was  the  story  my  friend  the  Arkansas 
rabbi  told.    It  is  from  the  folk-lore  of  Russia : 

198 


AS  TOLD  BY  THE  RABBI  199 

A  woman  who  had  lain  in  torment  a 
thousand  years  lifted  her  face  toward 
heaven  and  cried  to  the  Lord  to  set  her 
free,  for  she  could  endure  it  no  longer. 
And  he  looked  down  and  said :  "  Can 
you  remember  one  thing  you  did  for  a 
human  being  without  reward  in  your  earth 
life?" 

The  woman  groaned  in  bitter  anguish, 
for  she  had  lived  in  selfish  ease ;  the  neigh- 
bor had  been  nothing  to  her. 

"Was  there  not  one  ?    Think  well !" 

"Once  —  it  was  nothing  —  I  gave  to  a 
starving  man  a  carrot,  and  he  thanked  me." 

"Bring,  then,  the  carrot.     Where  is  it  V^ 

"It  is  long  since,  Lord,"  she  sobbed, 
"and  it  is  lost." 

"  Not  so ;  witness  of  the  one  unselfish 
deed    of   your   life,    it   could    not   perish. 


200  NEIGHBORS 

Go,"  said  the  Lord  to  an  angel,  "find  the 
carrot  and  bring  it  here." 

The  angel  brought  the  carrot  and  held 
it  over  the  bottomless  pit,  letting  it  down 
till  it  was  within  reach  of  the  woman. 
"Cling  to  it,"  he  said.  She  did  as  she  was 
bidden,  and  found  herself  rising  out  of 
her  misery. 

Now,  when  the  other  souls  in  torment 
saw  her  drawn  upward,  they  seized  her 
hands,  her  waist,  her  feet,  her  garments, 
and  clung  to  them  with  despairing  cries, 
so  that  there  rose  out  of  the  pit  an  ever- 
lengthening  chain  of  writhing,  wailing 
humanity  clinging  to  the  frail  root.  Higher 
and  higher  it  rose  till  it  was  half-way  to 
heaven,  and  still  its  burden  grew.  The 
woman  looked  down,  and  fear  and  anger 
seized   her  —  fear   that   the   carrot   would 


AS  TOLD   BY  THE  RABBI  201 

break,  and  anger  at  the  meddling  of  those 
strangers  who  put  her  in  peril.  She 
struggled,  and  beat  with  hands  and  feet 
upon  those  below  her. 

*'Let  go,"  she  cried;    "it  is  my  carrot." 

The  words  were  hardly  out  of  her  mouth 

before  the  carrot  broke,  and  she  fell,  with 

them  all,  back  into  torment,  and  the  pit 

swallowed  them  up. 

In  a  little  German  town  the  pious  Rabbi 
Jisroel  Isserlheim  is  deep  in  the  study  of 
the  sacred  writings,  when  of  a  sudden 
the  Messiah  stands  before  him.  The  time 
of  trial  of  his  people  is  past,  so  runs  his 
message ;  that  very  evening  he  will  come, 
and  their  sufferings  will  be  over.  He 
prays  that  his  host  will  summon  a  carriage 
in  which  he  may  make  his  entry  into  town. 


202  NEIGHBORS 

Trembling  with  pride  and  joy,  the  rabbi 
falls  at  his  feet  and  worships.  But  in 
the  very  act  of  rising  doubts  assail  him. 

"Thou  temp  test  me,  Master!"  he  ex- 
claims; "it  is  written  that  the  Messiah 
shall  come  riding  upon  an  ass." 

"Be  it  so.  Send  thou  for  the  ass." 
But  in  all  the  countryside  far  and  near  no 
ass  is  to  be  found ;  the  rabbi  knows  it. 
The  Messiah  waits. 

"Do  you  not  see  that  you  are  barring 
the  way  with  your  scruples  to  the  salva- 
tion you  long  for  ?  The  sun  is  far  in  the 
west ;  do  not  let  it  set,  for  if  this  day  pass, 
the  Jews  must  suffer  for  untold  ages  to 
come.  Would  you  set  an  ass  between  me 
and  the  salvation  of  my  people  ?" 

The  man  stands  irresolute.  "Ten  min- 
utes,  and   I  must  go,"   urges   his  visitor. 


AS  TOLD   BY  THE  RABBI  203 

But  at  last  the  rabbi  has  seen  his  duty 
clear. 

"No  Messiah  without  the  ass,"  he  cries; 
and  the  Messiah  goes  on  his  way. 

Once,  so  runs  the  legend,  there  lived  in 
far  Judean  hills  two  affectionate  brothers, 
tilling  a  common  field  together.  One  had 
a  wife  and  a  houseful  of  children ;  the 
other  was  a  lonely  man.  One  night  in  the 
harvest  time  the  older  brother  said  to  his 
wife:  "My  brother  is  a  lonely  man.  I 
will  go  out  and  move  some  of  the  sheaves 
from  my  side  of  the  field  over  on  his,  so 
that  when  he  sees  them  in  the  morning 
his  heart  will  be  cheered  by  the  abun- 
dance."    And  he  did. 

That  same  night  the  other  brother  said 
to  his  workmen  :  "  My  brother  has  a  house- 


204  NEIGHBORS 

ful  and  many  mouths  to  fill.  I  am  alone, 
and  do  not  need  all  this  wealth.  I  will 
go  and  move  some  of  my  sheaves  over  on 
his  field,  so  that  he  shall  rejoice  in  the 
morning  when  he  sees  how  great  is  his 
store."  And  he  did.  They  did  it  that 
night  and  the  next,  in  the  sheltering  dark. 
But  on  the  third  night  the  moon  came  out 
as  they  met  face  to  face,  each  with  his 
arms  filled  with  sheaves.  On  that  spot, 
says  the  legend,  was  built  the  Temple  of 
Jerusalem,  for  it  was  esteemed  that  there 
earth  came  nearest  heaven. 


THE  STRAND   FROM  ABOVE 

From  the  Danish  of  Johannes  Jorgensen 

The  sun  rose  on  a  bright  September 
morning.  A  thousand  gems  of  dew 
sparkled  in  the  meadows,  and  upon  the 
breeze  floated,  in  the  wake  of  summer,  the 
shining  silken  strands  of  which  no  man 
knoweth  the  whence  or  the  whither. 

One  of  them  caught  in  the  top  of  a 
tree,  and  the  skipper,  a  little  speckled 
yellow  spider,  quit  his  airship  to  survey 
the  leafy  demesne  there.  It  was  not  to 
his  liking,  and,  with  prompt  decision,  he 
spun  a  new  strand  and  let  himself  down 
straight  into  the  hedge  below. 

There  were  twigs  and  shoots  in  plenty 

205 


206  NEIGHBORS 

there  to  spin  a  web  in,  and  he  went  to 
work  at  once,  letting  the  strand  from 
above,  by  which  he  had  come,  bear  the 
upper  corner  of  it. 

A  fine  large  web  it  was  when  finished, 
and  with  this  about  it  that  set  it  off  from 
all  the  other  webs  thereabouts,  that  it 
seemed  to  stand  straight  up  in  the  air, 
without  anything  to  show  what  held  it. 
It  takes  pretty  sharp  eyes  to  make  out  a 
single  strand  of  a  spider-web,  even  a  very 
little  way  off. 

The  days  went  by.  Flies  grew  scarcer, 
as  the  sun  rose  later,  and  the  spider  had 
to  make  his  net  larger  that  it  might  reach 
farther  and  catch  more.  And  here  the 
strand  from  above  turned  out  a  great 
help.  With  it  to  brace  the  structure, 
the  web  was  spun  higher  and  wider,  until 


THE  STRAND  FROM  ABOVE        207 

it  covered  the  hedge  all  the  way  across. 
In  the  wet  October  mornings,  when  it 
hung  full  of  shimmering  raindrops,  it  was 
like  a  veil   stitched  with  precious  pearls. 

The  spider  was  proud  of  his  work. 
No  longer  the  little  thing  that  had  come 
drifting  out  of  the  vast  with  nothing  but 
its  unspun  web  in  its  pocket,  so  to  speak, 
he  was  now  a  big,  portly,  opulent  spider, 
with  the  largest  web  in  the  hedge. 

One  morning  he  awoke  very  much  out  of 
sorts.  There  had  been  a  frost  in  the  night, 
and  daylight  brought  no  sun.  The  sky  was 
overcast ;  not  a  fly  was  out.  All  the  long 
gray  autumn  day  the  spider  sat  hungry  and 
cross  in  his  corner.  Toward  evening,  to  kill 
time,  he  started  on  a  tour  of  inspection,  to 
see  if  anything  needed  bracing  or  mending. 
He  pulled  at  all   the  strands;    they  were 


208  NEIGHBORS 

firm  enough.  But  though  he  foujid  nothing 
wrong,  his  temper  did  not  improve;  he 
waxed  crosser  than  ever. 

At  the  farthest  end  of  the  web  he  came 
at  last  to  a  strand  that  all  at  once  seemed 
strange  to  him.  All  the  rest  went  this 
way  or  that  —  the  spider  knew  every 
stick  and  knob  they  were  made  fast  to, 
every  one.  But  this  preposterous  strand 
went  nowhere  —  that  is  to  say,  went 
straight  up  in  the  air  and  was  lost.  He 
stood  up  on  his  hind  legs  and  stared  with 
all  his  eyes,  but  he  could  not  make  it  out. 
To  look  at,  the  strand  went  right  up  into 
the  clouds,  which  was  nonsense. 

The  longer  he  sat  and  glared  to  no 
purpose,  the  angrier  the  spider  grew.  He 
had  quite  forgotten  how  on  a  bright  Sep- 
tember morning  he  himself  had  come  down 


THE  STRAND   FROM  ABOVE         209 

this  same  strand.  And  he  had  forgotten 
how,  in  the  building  of  the  web  and  after- 
ward when  it  had  to  be  enlarged,  it  was 
just  this  strand  he  had  depended  upon. 
He  saw  only  that  here  was  a  useless  strand, 
a  fool  strand,  that  went  nowhere  in  sense 
or  reason,  only  up  in  the  air  where  solid 
spiders  had  no  concern.  .  .  . 

"Away  with  it!"  and  with  one  vicious 
snap  of  his  angry  jaws  he  bit  the  strand 
in  two. 

That  instant  the  web  collapsed,  the 
whole  proud  and  prosperous  structure  fell 
in  a  heap,  and  when  the  spider  came  to 
he  lay  sprawling  in  the  hedge  with  the 
web  all  about  his  head  like  a  wet  rag. 
In  one  brief  moment  he  had  wrecked  it 
all  —  because  he  did  not  understand  the 
use  of  the  strand  from  above. 


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THE   WORKS  OF  JACOB  A.  RIIS 


"JTHE  death  on  May  26,  iqi4,  of  JACOB  A.  RIIS,  social  reformer  and  civil 
worker,  "  New  York's  Most  Useful  Citizen,"  as  he  was  deservedly  called  by 
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should  find  a  place  in  every  American  home. 

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THE  MAKING  OF  AN  AMERICAN.     An  Autobiography 

"  It  is  refreshing  to  find  a  book  so  unique  and  captivating  as  'The  Making 
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off  from  the  world's  main  currents,  and  the  charm  of  showing  the  origins  of  an 
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Denmark,  where  the  big  winter  storms  sometimes  drive  the  sea  up  with  a  rush 
and  a  swirl  to  the  old-fashioned  houses,  where  railroads  were  not  known,  where 
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THEODORE  ROOSEVELT :    The  Citizen 

"  It  is  written  from  the  heart.  It  breathes  sincerity  and  conviction  in  every 
line.  It  emphasizes  not  so  much  the  forces  and  influences  which  lifted  Theo- 
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THE  BATTLE  WITH  THE  SLUM 

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form under  conditions  that  would  harden  the  hearts  of  many  men  and  certainly 
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thought  which  ennobles  the  struggle."  —  New  York  Mail. 

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CHILDREN  OF  THE  TENEMENTS 

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to  commend  to  all  women."  —  Lotdsville  Post. 

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with  much  success.  It  is  gratifying,  therefore,  that  in  this  book  the 
briny  deep  furnishes  the  background  —  in  some  instances  the  plot 
itself —  for  each  one  of  its  eleven  tales.  Coupled  with  his  own  inti- 
mate knowledge  and  appreciation  of  the  oceans  and  the  life  that  is 
lived  on  them  —  a  knowledge  and  appreciation  born  in  him  through 
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the  sea  —  he  has  a  powerful  style  of  writing.  Vividness  is  perhaps 
its  distinguishing  characteristic,  though  fluency  and  a  peculiar  feel- 
ing for  words  also  mark  it. 


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tiresome  analyses  but  by  means  of  a  series  of  dramatic  incidents. 
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really  showing  a  cross  section  of  life. 


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for  a  woman.  Jennie  Gushing  is  an  exceedingly  interesting 
character,  perhaps  the  most  interesting  of  any  that  Ivlrs.  Watts 
has  yet  given  us.  The  novel  is  her  life  and  little  else,  but  that 
is  a  life  filled  with  a  variety  of  experiences  and  touching  closely 
many  different  strata  of  humankind.  Throughout  it  all,  from 
the  days  when  as  a  thirteen-year-old,  homeless,  friendless  waif, 
Jennie  is  sent  to  a  reformatory,  to  the  days  when  her  beauty  is 
the  inspiration  of  a  successful  painter,  there  is  in  the  narrative 
an  appeal  to  the  emotions,  to  the  sympathy,  to  the  affections, 
that  cannot  be  gainsaid. 


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